Wednesday, July 14, 2004
I, Robot
Jeremy sent me an email which voiced others' displeasure over the upcoming I, Robot movie, with particular speculation as to how fast Asimov was spinning in his grave (and how much electricity we might be wasting by not using Asimov as a turbine).1From the trailers, the movie looks nothing like the book and I really wonder what Asimov would be thinking if he were alive.
Well, "So what?" you ask, "Movies and books often differ greatly."2 Well this movie (from the trailers) goes against Asimov's explicit aims with I, Robot.
To explain why this movie would be such an affront to Asimov, let me give you a little background on I, Robot, and Asimov's contribution to robots in science fiction literature. I, Robot is a collection of short stories that present quirky little mental puzzles based on differences in interpretations of the three laws of robotics between what the humans at US Robots intended and how the robots understood the laws.
Specifically, the three laws of robotics are the following:
0. A robot may not injure humanity, or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.
Asimov developed the laws of robotics and his formulation of robots specifically as a way of changing the way literature presented robots. In particular Asimov wanted robots to be more than the servile automatons of Capek's R.U.R. or the evil robots ready to turn on their masters that were popular then (and still are - one even is governor of California).
Asimov's robots were thus designed (through use of the three laws) to be neither automatons nor something that would rise up against humans. So judging by the trailers, I, Robot the movie, is antithetical to Asimov's second objective in writing I, Robot the book.
All that being said, I'll still see the movie, I just won't expect it to look anything like the book and will have to turn off the part of my brain that knows the book.
A good summary of Asimov's I, Robot can be found at wikipedia (where else?).
Footnotes
1. Asimov was cremated and his ashes scattered(that's a pretty twisted concept for a site), and thus strictly cannot be spinning in his grave. Perhaps blowing about vigorously... (This fact was alluded to in the emailed posts.)
2. The zeroth law does appear in I, Robot, while Oglivaw does not.
3. Daneel Oglivaw also rather bizarrely shows up towards the end of the Foundation series. Even though I'll probably see Alien v Predator, I'm not a big cross-over fan and I think that cross-overs weaken an author's work when not handled appropriately (which is a difficult thing to do).
4. Don't even get me started on the David Lynch's theatrical version of Dune's weirding way. While I do get my jollies walking up to people and saying Naaaaaaaaaahhhhhh CHUCK! (I'm a pretty weird fellow), it was nothing like the weirding way in Dune which was more of an advanced style of hand-to-hand combat with insanely fast movements (pseudo-teleportation or perhaps local time-dilation) instead of a sonic amplification weapon. The SciFi miniseries were much better, and the theatrical version actually disturbed me because it was no where close to the book.
Comments(1) |
Well, "So what?" you ask, "Movies and books often differ greatly."2 Well this movie (from the trailers) goes against Asimov's explicit aims with I, Robot.
To explain why this movie would be such an affront to Asimov, let me give you a little background on I, Robot, and Asimov's contribution to robots in science fiction literature. I, Robot is a collection of short stories that present quirky little mental puzzles based on differences in interpretations of the three laws of robotics between what the humans at US Robots intended and how the robots understood the laws.
Specifically, the three laws of robotics are the following:
1. A robot may not harm a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.There's also a pseudo zeroth law of (some) robots that naturally arose and was most famously carried out by Daneel Oglivaw in several books other than I, Robot.2,3 The zeroth law states that:
2. A robot must obey the orders given to it by the human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence, as long as such protection does not conflict the First or Second Law.
0. A robot may not injure humanity, or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.
Asimov developed the laws of robotics and his formulation of robots specifically as a way of changing the way literature presented robots. In particular Asimov wanted robots to be more than the servile automatons of Capek's R.U.R. or the evil robots ready to turn on their masters that were popular then (and still are - one even is governor of California).
Asimov's robots were thus designed (through use of the three laws) to be neither automatons nor something that would rise up against humans. So judging by the trailers, I, Robot the movie, is antithetical to Asimov's second objective in writing I, Robot the book.
All that being said, I'll still see the movie, I just won't expect it to look anything like the book and will have to turn off the part of my brain that knows the book.
A good summary of Asimov's I, Robot can be found at wikipedia (where else?).
Footnotes
1. Asimov was cremated and his ashes scattered(that's a pretty twisted concept for a site), and thus strictly cannot be spinning in his grave. Perhaps blowing about vigorously... (This fact was alluded to in the emailed posts.)
2. The zeroth law does appear in I, Robot, while Oglivaw does not.
3. Daneel Oglivaw also rather bizarrely shows up towards the end of the Foundation series. Even though I'll probably see Alien v Predator, I'm not a big cross-over fan and I think that cross-overs weaken an author's work when not handled appropriately (which is a difficult thing to do).
4. Don't even get me started on the David Lynch's theatrical version of Dune's weirding way. While I do get my jollies walking up to people and saying Naaaaaaaaaahhhhhh CHUCK! (I'm a pretty weird fellow), it was nothing like the weirding way in Dune which was more of an advanced style of hand-to-hand combat with insanely fast movements (pseudo-teleportation or perhaps local time-dilation) instead of a sonic amplification weapon. The SciFi miniseries were much better, and the theatrical version actually disturbed me because it was no where close to the book.
Comments(1) |
1. D'oh! For whatever reason, I've been saying "Oglivaw" for some years now and just typed it without checking.
2. Law 2 (accept any orders) is problematic as an idealized human morality, but otherwise, yup.
3.I've not read the 3 B's robot novels. Perhaps I should. On Caves of Steel - it may be a neccessity to film it for less than $40 million after I, Robot...
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2. Law 2 (accept any orders) is problematic as an idealized human morality, but otherwise, yup.
3.I've not read the 3 B's robot novels. Perhaps I should. On Caves of Steel - it may be a neccessity to film it for less than $40 million after I, Robot...
