Eisenstein, Phyllis and Alex

Eisenstein, Phyllis, and Alex Eisenstein. "Von Neumann's Bug." In Gateways. Ed. Elizabeth Anne Hull. New York: Tom Doherty Associates, 2010. "A Tor Book" festschrift in honor of Frederik Pohl. Pp. [94]-104 (with Afterword).

Features "Bert" (not exactly its name), an interstellar, possibly intergalactic, exploring device that is a Von Neumann machine, a self-replicating mechanical/cybernetic "bug" that lands in suburban or small-town America, takes samples, and produces generations of other, fly-size Von Neumann machines. These machines become a cybernetic swarm and combine into a highly advanced rocket ship and fly off, observed by NORAD's AI "strategic operations computer named MIMTAC," who (sic) "raised no alarm" (103). See for a concentrated short story ("velocity exercise" as Pohl once called it), in that sense like Pohl's "Day Million" — but longer and with a sense of threat.

3. FICTION, RDE, 28/IV/11