But on the pondering side, I wonder if Al calling Sulla kid was at first a sort of distancer of her from himself/his code/DNA/etc, but now when I read it I feel like it’s a term of endearment/acceptance of her, in a roundabout way. It’s a bit hard to explain but it’s like, yeah, she’s a kid, and she’s not his kid (as in he didn’t raise her, so I doubt he thinks of her as that), but she has a bond with him through code/DNA and them living together, and it’s clear he’s grown fond of her, so I feel like it’s sort of… an acceptance term now.

I read the ‘But I – I HAD to’ bit as ‘Once my friends saw that I wasn’t human, I had to fly off’ (if someone fears the reaction that people are expected to have enough, then they’d hardly stick around to be subjected to it). I’m coming at this from the same angle that I’m approaching Al’s internalized homophobia (ch 2, pgs 57-58; ch 4, pg 76).

Al is AI Jesus, no?

If most/all AI code is Al-reverent, then well, yeah.

Hmm what does “had to” mean here? It could be metaphorical like the phrase usually means, but it could also be literal; leftover code from Al’s day, just like the construction robot. Maybe her will isn’t free as it seems.

I’d be a tad suspicious if my teen daughter flew away from a construction sight and started saying she wasn’t smart enough about something that only she and my ex lover seem to know about. It seems more like Brendan just wants answers and his anger is driving into that.

I think he’s just looking for someone to be angry at, it’s definitely not fair to Al, but it’s pretty human.