"What is your specialty, Doctor?" Dodd asked.
"I'm a neurologist."
That was good, Rick thought. A neurologist was exactly what Marks seemed to need.
"Do you make anything of this?" Dodd asked.
The doctor shook his head. "Nothing. I've never seen a case like it. I've never even heard of one. In fact, I know of only one analogue, and it's an electronic one. Do you know how computers work? The big electronic brains?"
The three nodded.
"Then you will understand. I have worked with computers, and now and then one of them suddenly starts turning out gibberish for no apparent reason. A check of the circuits may show that everything is functionally normal. Yet, the gibberish continues. Often it clears up, with no more reason than it started. Sometimes this happens when the machine is cold, before it is properly warmed up. At other times, it happens when the machine is tired."
"Tired?" Dodd looked his disbelief. "Machines don't get tired. Not in those terms."
Chavez smiled. "Perhaps not. Yet, to those who work with them, it does sometimes appear that the machine is tired. There is really no other expression for it."
Rick knew something of this through his association with Dr. Parnell Winston of the Spindrift staff. Winston was an expert in the new science of cybernetics, which is defined as the science of communications and control mechanisms in both living beings and machines.