It's actually a Dune reference. The setting is all whacked out on superbrains that need spice to live because they banned computers. It's like their one big commandment. Anyways the prohibition is the result of the Butlerian Jihad. The author very very likely named it after Samuel Butler, a dude who advocated destroying all advanced technology in 1863. The Jihad was never described and could've just been humanity rejecting total dependence on computers in a way that manifested religiously, but then some later dude tacked onto the canon that there was an actual 2 generation long war with the machines because fuck an original idea involving machine revolution