n a fascinating speech on "The Impact of Science On Society," Isaac Asimov describes how he changed all the rules for robot fiction
back in 1939. He was tired of the then-current stereotypes portraying robots as "menaces or sort of wistful little creatures" that generally turned
on their creators to punish them for playing god and creating life. In
Asimov's opinion, robots were tools, machines like any other human-built
machines. They just needed some reasonable safeguards built in. The rest
is history.
"Robbie" (a.k.a. "Strange Playfellow," published in 1940) was Asimov's
first robot story, and it featured a robot that was sort of a wistful
creature--but that was also a tool with a defined position in society.
Subsequent 1940s short stories codified that position with The Three
Laws of Robotics, Asimov's most enduring contribution to science
fiction. In three short, self-referential rules, robots were defined as
servitors and protectors to humanity, with self-preservation as a
distinctly third priority.
Of course, if the rules worked all the time, there wouldn't be much
to write about. In Asimov's seminal stories, collected in I,
Robot with some brief connective tissue grafted in, the rules are
fleshed out, bent and sometimes broken. Many of these stories serve as
mental puzzles: when a robot starts behaving in a bizarrely erratic
fashion, which Law or what Law-conflicting command prompted the logical breakdown? What would happen in a situation where two Laws clashed inextricably? But some of I, Robot, is simply early
speculation about how humans and intelligent machines could live
together.
Stiff but serviceable--and certainly celebrated
The stories in I, Robot aren't necessarily Asimov's best.
They're generally simple, sometimes stiff early works, charmingly boyish
but not stylistically sophisticated. Of course, some stand out more than others. "Liar!" the story of a telepathic robot trying to resolve a First Law
paradox by not harming humans--even though his efforts themselves cause
harm--is particularly sharply written. And "Little Robot Lost" is noteworthy for being both clever and intense.
Yet most of these are simple stories. But at the same time they are also among Asimov's most quintessential works. They are where the word "robotics" was first coined (accidentally, Asimov later said--he just assumed it was already a word) and where the science fictional concept of robots as intelligent machines--whether functional or dysfunctional, fault-ridden or flawless, still machines rather than tin humans or moralistic forces--was born.
This is the book that inspired an Alan Parsons Project album and a Harlan Ellison screenplay, that sent journalists and essayists scurrying
to Asimov whenever anything went wrong (or right) in the field of
artificial intelligence, and that set the standard on robotic thought
for decades to come. (TV's Buck Rogers and Star Trek: The Next Generation being just two examples of works that directly referenced the Three Laws.)
Most importantly, this is the book that set the stage for
Asimov's career in writing about robots, the book that first launched
his by-now-legendary reputation in SF circles. Quite an impressive heritage for what on its surface is merely a thin collection of "whatdunit" riddles.
