You must be referring to the Mentats. They're completely human. Computers, robots, or anything that can be considered a "thinking machine" is outlawed by law and religion in the Dune Universe. One of their major commandments is "Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of the human mind."

This goes back to humanity's struggle with the Thinking Machines which helped enslave them.

Since computers aren't allowed, they have to get by training humans to do the work computers would normally do.

Mentats are like human computers, able to do high level computations.

There are other kinds, but I'll you discover them yourself.

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Posted by Bert Macklin FBI

Quantico

Member since May 2013

9086 posts

Posted on 1/30/24 at 2:55 pm to boxcarbarney

quote:
You must be referring to the Mentats. They're completely human.

"This is a Mentat, Feyd. It has been trained and conditioned to perform certain duties. The fact that its encased in a human body, however, must not be overlooked. A serious drawback, that. I sometimes think the ancients with their thinking machines had the right idea."

This is the quote that lead me to believe that a Menatat was a robot. With your added info I can see where I misinterpreted but it definitely made it seem like it was only "encased in a human body" not a human in and of itself. I assume its because the Baron just thinks himself above the Mentat?

I find the worst part of reading books is that I don't have anyone to talk them out with like I would with a GOT type show. If y'all (Boxcar) don't mind, I will report back every now and then and we can discuss whats happening.

This post was edited on 1/30/24 at 2:57 pm

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