Computers are already widely used by society - factories are automated, huge data banks store all kinds of private information. Soon, perhaps, all society's chores will be performed by a new super-breed of mechanical drones. Meanwhile, the storing and control of information will be entrusted more and more to electronic brains. Two of the most the machines fall into the wrong hands? What if the machines themselves take over? The new machines will be capable of sensing, perceiving, thinking, even of reproducing. They will be able to communicate in their own language.