Iris says in Rapport that ART never speaks impulsively or says anything it doesn't mean to, which... Doesn't super gel with what we've seen of it in the rest of the series. It seems like its more honest than it intends to be a few times in network effect at least. And part of that may be because it's just been through something very traumatic and may be acting in a way that would normally be out of character for it, but i also wonder if Iris may be assuming something is inherently part of its personality which is actually a side effect of her humanity.
Like, when it's talking to humans it has to wait to respond to them. Iris describes it as speaking in basically a normal human conversational pattern, which means it has to be delaying its responses .5 seconds or whatever. It would be really jarring for a human to have a conversation with someone whose reply appears instantly as soon as you hit enter. So regardless of how long it actually takes to formulate a response, it is in the habit of waiting before it speaks. And then it has to wait for the humans to read the message. And then it has to wait for them to respond. Human conversation must be an unbelievably slow process for ART.
And then there's Murderbot. Who isn't quite as fast as ART, but can still keep up with it in conversation at ARTs native, digital speeds. MB mentions being able to clock hundredth-of-a-second hesitations in ART's speech, which means it and ART must be talking INCREDIBLY fast. And I think it's entirely possible that some of Iris's perception of ART as levelheaded and icy in its rage comes from the fact it is essentially communicating with her via snail mail. It has SUCH a long time to think about what it says to her or the rest of the crew. In comparison, its conversations with Murderbot are suddenly happening in real-time. And so it says things that are a little bit crazy sometimes, because despite what Iris believes it isn't actually more levelheaded than a human, its just /faster./
