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How Isaac Asimov's Non-Deadly Robots Got Lethal

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cash907
05/24/09

In reply to How Isaac Asimov's Non-Deadly Robots Got Lethal
Dors didn't deactivate due to her actions resulting in the death of a human being, she deactivated because the human being she killed had figured out she was a robot, and used a device to scramble her positronic pathways beyond repair about a millisecond before she bashed his head in, literally. She had harmed humans numerous times before this, serving as Seldon's bodyguard, which shouldn't have been able to happen unless the Zeroeth law was sufficiently strong enough to override the First law. The only reason she was able to do something that Giskard and his kind could not, was because her brain was designed with the Zeroeth law hardwired in, instead of as a philosophical concept as it was for him, as well as her creator R. Daneel Olivaw.

You need to go back and reread Asimov's books Alasdair... your memory is slipping a bit.
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Alasdair Wilkins
05/24/09

@cash907: I'm going to have to disagree with you somewhat. I actually looked over the relevant passages from Forward the Foundation in writing this post, and although I glossed over the role of the Electro-Clarifier (something I've now corrected) I'm still pretty sure she had some problems with so completely violating the First Law. Specifically, she says: "I finally killed a human being. --First time. --Makes it worse." That's clearly ascribing at least a portion of her pain to the killing itself, not her poisoning. Either way, she's pretty deadly, and that's my real point.
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Grey_Area
05/24/09

In reply to How Isaac Asimov's Non-Deadly Robots Got Lethal
It's a shame everyone forgets Asimov's role on the long-running TV comedy the Goodies.

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Anekanta - Go Play!
05/24/09

@Grey_Area: He seems so young!
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Grey_Area
05/24/09

@Atnakena: Time travel, duh.
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