In the height of the Cold War, a Polish author by the name of Stanislaw Lem (pronounced: stah-nis-wahv lem) was working feverishly publishing short science fiction works rapidly. He became something of a superstar in the realm of science fiction and fantasy, known most for his uncanny ideas and his novel approaches to common motifs of the genre, such as the meaning of human life, the puzzling introduction of robot life into the world, and perhaps even the ideas of our technology progressing past our ability to control it.
This last question is the dominant feature of this collection, and so the work has a more serious, horrific aspect to it, while others of his works show off his abilities as a humorist and optimist. This work shows off his pessimistic abilities, letting his speculations wander into dark places, such as "necroevolution," which was his work for the lifeless process of technological evolution. The implication is that such an evolutionary system might threaten us and our survival on earth. He also deals seriously with swarm intelligence or hive-mind computers.
Keep in mind that Lem wrote these stories in the 1960's, or maybe even the late 50's, so in terms of sci-fi he is way ahead of his time, and many of his ideas can be applied directly to our modern dilemmas, such as artificial intelligence and the development of a robot slave class. Essentially, the central question of the collection involves the development of self-replicating machinery, which would constitute another evolutionary timeline on the earth that did not depend on food, but electromagnetism.
