Life Probe [Paperback]

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Del Rey Books (Science Fiction and Fantasy) (1984)
• ASIN: B001DQQJOG
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,929,164 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Political Sci-Fi, November 15, 2001

By 

Lance Menthe (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Life Probe (Paperback)

Although the writing and character development are generally lackluster, what makes Life Probe an intriguing novel is the political angle. Written during the Cold War, Life Probe shows a remarkable ability to think beyond the US-Russia framework and envision a world afterward. Like many authors, McCollum hypothesizes that a nuclear war in the near future leads to the development of a functioning United Nations. In this context, North-South political wrangling in the 21st century underlies much of the book. The book is somewhat right-wing, in that a "Star Wars"-type defense system is depicted as being highly successful in preventing much of the damage from the near-future nuclear war, and the discussion of the North-South conflict is strongly biased against the South. Nevertheless, McCollum does discuss the issues and makes a reasonable case for both sides--which impressed me. Two other aspects of the book are well worth mentioning: (1) the alien spacecraft's view of Earth and its attempts to manipulate Earth politics are well depicted, and (2) the discussion of science hits just the right balance between the technical and the descriptive. The political wrangling never leads to a real moral dilemma for the reader, since you always know who to root for, and the picture of parliamentary maneuvering is naive--but the book is charming, balanced, supported by interesting ideas, and has enough twists and turns to keep a reader happy. I recommend it as a good light read. On balance, I think it's McCollum's best novel.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Life Probe very very Gripping, synthetic life struggles for existence, October 1, 2009

By 

L Steven Richards "L Steven Richards (stvrich... (Long Island) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Life Probe (Paperback)

I read this when it first came out. I am BACK to re-acquire the book. (see my review of Procyons Promise, which is Part II of this 2 book series. I loved it so much that "ProcyonsPromise" is my eBay ID!!!-- bear in mind I have not read these stories for decades!) In Life Probe, Earth is "discovered" by an alien probe, but as it approaches earth a micro-black hole demolishes this priceless artifically intelligent artifact. Upon the Probe's approach to earth it had sampled enough of human communication to determine that it's own communications needs would be best served by creating an quasi-human (or potentially human-capable) artifical intelligence that could learn rapidly and act as an interface for the Greater Alien-AI-proper. The AI creates the interface with minimal info regarding the race of origin, it's history, and technology (basic security approach). It's sole (original) purpose, is to communicate with humans. The new AI is a "baby" living in the microcosm of the Alien-AI's computational world. It is a small instrument on a sub-system of the AI-proper's primary systems. After creation of the simulacrum--- the life probe is suddenly devastated by an unforsee-able accident. Leaving only the minimally sentient (yet very ready to "talk") quasi-human AI consciousness as sole-surviving remnant of the alien technological marvel. Humans interact with it, and learn from IT, as it learns a little bit also about it's own creator (the greater but now DEAD AI), and indirectly deduces from it's fundamental technology/programming clues, some few facts about the Aliens of it's origin. Now the humans have a quasi-human alien technology-based "life form" that also wants to find the aliens of origin. Thus, the greater story unfolds... And a compelling reason for the HUMANS to take up this search. But the primary introductory parts of this novel are simply detailed dramatically to anyone who is a lover of technology. extremely well done. A good read. Yes, I have given details of the story out... TRUST ME, it is SO GOOD, that even tho I KNOW the story...

I want to read it again.
and obviously, I've read it a couple times before.
It's a good story, for lovers of Hard SciFi.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This was a very Entertaining Read for someone who likes Tech, December 17, 2001

By 

Lloyd S Richards (Lindenhurst, NY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Life Probe (Paperback)

There was enough of a Story to pull it along nicely.
I was captivated by the Romance of a Life Probe / A.I. struggling to "Continue Existing" despite HORRENDOUS damage.

The majority of the Life Probe was damaged.

Part of the probe continued its existence in an A.I. form that was CREATED by the Original Life Probe. This form allowed the Human Community to interact with it Much like a human, and actually we freely adopted its technologies that it was based on, with it's own intelligent assistance. Note, that the ORIGINAL purpose of the Life Probe A.I. was lost with the immense damage that it took. The only part of the "probe" that remained was its experimental "Human Model" that it (the much more intelligent and ALIEN life probe ENTIRE) was going to use to study/communicate with the Humans.

After the probe was damaged, We humans were able to freely investigate it(since it could not defend itself). We could freely speculate on it's origins and use the technology that it was based on to further our OWN development and purposes.

A very interesting fantasy.
A very intelligent & powerful machine that fell prey to circumstance, and became OUR unwitting "benefactor" And a source of new technology in more ways than one.

I'm re-purchasing the book b/c I read it in the 80's and thought it was excellent.