- Silicate (AI)
Silicates were a race of
android s created by humanity to be servants in the1995 -1996 television series .History
The Silicates were created to be soldiers however they developed an intelligence and sentience of their own after they were infected by the "Take a Chance" computer virus created by Dr. Ken Stranahan. This sparked an AI rebellion by the Silicates who attempted to free themselves from human rule. This long war continued for many years until the Silicates captured military space craft and escaped into space. As they went into space, the Silicates suffered from a lack of maintenance which caused problems for them.
The Silicates serve as mercenaries and actually aid the alien
Chigs in their war against humanity.Capabilities
The A.I.'s (Artificial Intelligence) were manufactured by humanity to serve them and, as such, appear as
human s but with enough differences to appear as machine creations, namely the rifle sight-like crosshairs in place ofpupil s. They were made to be beautiful and physically appealing by their makers.Silicates communicate with one another through modulation schemes made by wireless telephone which comes across to humans as a series of electronic beeps and chirps. This wireless network allows each A.I. to know the position and operating status of the other units. Their mechanical nature allows them to store information and retrieve it making them excellent in information gathering which can be shared with their colleagues when demanded.
As the A.I. Silicates were created as a "servitor" species, they were not programmed for abstract thought. This makes them incapable of original thought and creativity which leaves them to simply imitate rather than create. Had the "Take a Chance"
computer virus not been created, it is likely the Silicates would have remained within their servant race role. As such, it has become the prime ideology of the A.I silicates which results in them seeing activities as a risk or gamble. The first "risk" was the indiscriminate killing of "carbonites" which lasted for ten years in the A.I. War.Other
The Silicates are similar to the Cylons from the later reimagined "Battlestar Galactica", and many other rogue AI's from science fiction..
The Synthetics from the "Alien" movies are similar in appearance and role, however, they served as assistants.
The character of Dr. Stranahan took his name from the show's visual effects supervisor of the same name.ee also
*
Chigs
*InVitro
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.