Fall of Reach - Cortana

Cortana was a “smart” AI, an advanced artificial construct. Actually, the terms smart and dumb as applied to AIs, were misleading; all AIs were extraordinarily intelligent. But Cortana was special.

So-called dumb AIs were engineered to function only were misleading; within set limits of their dynamic memory-processing matrix. They were brilliant within their fields of expertise, but were lacking in “creativity.” Déjà, for example, was a “dumb” AI—incredibly useful, but limited.

Smart AIs like Cortana, however, had no limits on their dynamic memory-processor matrix. Knowledge and creativity could grow unchecked. She would pay a price for her genius, however. Such growth eventually led to self-interference. Cortana would one day literally start thinking too much at the expense of her normal functions.

It was as if a human were to think with so much of his brain that he stopped sending impulses to his heart and lungs. Like all the other smart AIs that Dr. Halsey had worked with over the years, Cortana would effectively “die” after an operational life of seven years.

- Halo: The Fall of Reach, Chapter 25