wetware n.

biological structures or systems regarded as analogous to computer equipment; (specif.) the human brain; the mind, esp. when able to be affected or altered by computer processes

  • 1963 W. Millis & J. Real Abolition of War p. xv

    What is not understood is the power hunger that resides in what the psychiatrist Kenneth Colby calls the ‘wetware’—the human brain about which we know very little except that it is composed of about 75 percent water.

  • 1984 J. Varley Press Enter in Asimov’s Science Fiction May 122 page image John Varley bibliography

    ‘He sure was a tricky bugger. Definitely some glitches in the wetware.’ She tapped the side of her head meaningfully.

  • 1986 D. Langford Critical Mass: To Be Continued in White Dwarf Aug. 9 David Langford

    You may not believe in killer programs which invade the brain, but Neuromancer, if you once let it into your wetware, isn’t easily erased.

  • 1987 M. Swanwick Vacuum Flowers in Asimov’s Science Fiction Feb. 180 page image Michael Swanwick bibliography

    My family wanted to send me to the University of Faraway, for a degree in the mind arts, but I wanted to get into wetware design.

  • 1988 R. Rucker Wetware vi. 66 Rudy Rucker bibliography

    They did the brain well; they teased out all its sparks and tastes and tangles, all its stimulus/response patterns—the whole biocybernetic software of Cobb’s mind. With this wetware code in hand, the boppers designed a program to simulate Cobb’s personality.

  • 2005 C. Stross Accelerando iii. 108 Charles Stross bibliography

    There’s an audible hiss of pink noise as his glasses whisper in his ears, bone conduction providing a serial highway to his wetware.

  • 2012 D. Brin Existence vi. 413 David Brin bibliography

    Amateurs…equipped with every kind of immersion hardware, software, and wetware money could buy.

Last modified 2021-01-27 21:09:30
In the compilation of some entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries in OED.