"The Day the Earth Stood Still"...radio adaptations

One of those science fiction offerings that escaped the pale of radioactive creatures that run amuck destroying cities and eating people. The 1951 film was sophisticated and a huge success. Below are two radio adaptations that followed that stared Michael Rennie.

Actor Michael Rennie reprises his role as Klaatu for the radio listening audience. Jean Peters plays Helen Benson. Billy Gray is recognizable as the character of Bobby Benson and Professor Barnhardt.

Hollywood Radio Theater [ca. 1953]

Lux Radio Theater [Episode 863, January 4th, 1954]

Thematic material: Technology limitations, messianic portrayal of Klaatu, limitations of robots [Gort].

Harry May and Alpha the robot...sort of

Alpha

Muriel Angelina embracing Harry May’s creation in 1932.

Time...

November 5th,, 1934

Last week Alpha, the robot, made its first public appearance in the U. S. One of the most ingenious automatons ever contrived by man, a grim and gleaming monster 6 ft. 4 in. tall, the robot was brought to Manhattan by its owner-inventor-impresario, Professor Harry May of London, and installed on the fifth floor of R. H. Macy & Co.'s department store. Encased from head to foot in chromium-plated steel armor, Alpha sat on a specially constructed dais with its cumbrous feet securely bolted to the floor, stared impassively over the knot of newshawks and store officials waiting for the first demonstration. The creature had a great sullen slit of a mouth, vast protuberant eyes, shaggy curls of rolled metal. In one mailed fist Alpha clutched a revolver.

Professor May, a dapper, blond, beak-nosed man in his middle thirties, signaled his assistant who drew a curtain behind the stage, revealing the massive control cabinets to which the robot was wired.

Said the crisp British voice of Professor May: "Wake up!"

The eyes of the automaton glowed red.

"Stand up!"

The robot clicked and whirred. Pivoting at knees and waist, it slowly stood up.

"Raise your right arm." Alpha gave a tremendous Nazi salute.

When commanded, the robot lowered its arm, raised the other, lowered it, turned its head from side to side, opened and closed its prognathous jaw, sat down. Then Impresario May asked Alpha a question:

"How old are you?"

From the robot's interior a cavernous Cockney voice responded:

"Fourteen years."

May: What do you weigh?

Alpha: One ton.

A dozen other questions and answers followed, some elaborately facetious. When May inquired what the automaton liked to eat, it responded with a minute-long discourse on the virtues of toast made with Macy's automatic electric toaster. Finally when May requested the creature to raise its arm and fire the pistol, the arm went up, the metal forefinger pulled the trigger, the firing-pin fell with a click. Professor May explained that store officials would not permit him to use blank cartridges.

Alpha's master asked his auditors to give any of his questions and commands, using exactly the same words. Sometimes the robot responded promptly, sometimes not until Professor May repeated the words.

For such pictures as King Kong Hollywood has devised automatons capable of more complex movements than Alpha, but never one that responded to the human voice. Anxious to avoid any suspicion of ventriloquism or of a hidden assistant pushing control buttons, Professor May removed the robot's breast plate, disclosing a mechanism like the interior of an ordinary radio. Publicly he explained that Alpha's repertory of answers consisted of 20 or 30 recordings on wax cylinders, as in oldtime phonographs, which were run off in the control cabinets and reproduced from the loud speaker in the robot's chest. Alpha cannot really understand language, but he can respond to a variety of set questions the answers to which have been prepared in advance.

Privately Professor May explained more. Heart of the robot system is an ordinary cathode-ray oscillograph, an electronic device which, when voice modulations are converted into electrical impulses as in a telephone, makes a jagged up-and-down record of them. Since different voices are differently pitched the device is rigged to ignore absolute pitch but to respond to relative pitch variations which occur in sequence in certain word combinations as pronounced by most speakers. Different combinations of variations close different combinations of relay circuits, and each combination of circuits is hooked up to the appropriate wax cylinder which supplies the answer, or to the proper motor which moves the robot as directed. Thus Alpha may answer "Seven" when asked "How many days in the week?" but remains dumb if the question is phrased "A week has how many days?"

Alpha was not quite correct in giving its age as 14. Professor May, a clever free-lance experimenter in electronics who is now working on voice-operated safes for banks, conceived Alpha 14 years ago but did not endow the robot with its present versatility until last year. He says it is now foolproof although it has not always been so. Once it fired its pistol without warning, blasting the skin off the professor's arm from wrist to elbow. Another time it lowered its arm unexpectedly, struck an assistant on the shoulder, bruised him so badly that he was hospitalized.

paleofuture...

"Alpha the Robot Shoots His Inventor (1932)"

August 15th, 2010

During the autumn of 1932 a group of curious onlookers assembled in Brighton, England to see inventor Harry May's latest invention, Alpha the robot. The mechanical man was controlled by verbal commands and sat in a chair silently while May carefully placed a gun in Alpha's hand. May then walked across the room to set up a target for the robot to shoot.

Seemingly more man than machine, and without a word from its inventor, the robot rose to its feet. May commanded the two-ton robot to sit, but instead it took a step forward. As the machine slowly raised the pistol, women in the audience screamed and men shouted warnings to the inventor. May commanded the robot to stop. "Drop that gun and sit down!" he screamed to no effect. Naturally, the inventor rose his hand to defend himself. Alpha the robot squeezed the trigger and in one quick, violent moment the discharged bullet pierced flesh and shattered the bones in May's hand.

The robot stood motionless, its arm outstretched with the smoking gun. May's voice could be heard, again desperately attempting to command the robot, "Back to your chair, Alpha! And drop that gun!"

This time, to everyone's amazement, the robot obeyed its master's command. The gun fell to the floor and the robot returned to its chair.

As a doctor tended to May, the inventor calmly explained, "I always had a feeling that Alpha would turn on me some day, but this is the first time he ever disobeyed my commands. I can't understand why he fired before I gave the proper signal."

Newspapers across the United States took this story and ran with it. An editorial from a Louisiana newspaper even proclaimed that the era of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was upon us. The bold new world of automation was to be feared. Mechanical men of our own creation were sure to destroy us all.

With the benefit of hindsight we can say that this series of events never happened, or were at the very least, wildly exaggerated. A much tamer version of the story was reported in far fewer newspapers, (just one by my count), but still contained the sensationalistic headline, "Maker Is Shot by Robot He Invented." In this version of the story May was inserting a cartridge into the gun, which was attached to the robot, and an accidental, premature discharge simply burned the inventor's hand.

Such fantastic feats ascribed to robots are so obviously absurd to today's skeptical minds. Robotic machines are just now beginning to complete the most basic tasks of walking up stairs, slowly running, and "recognizing" faces. Such autonomous movement, as described in the story of Alpha turning on its inventor, is only recently beginning to be seen in robots being developed by Honda, Toyota and in elite universities around the world.

But why did these articles run in so many newspapers across the country? Why were people apt to believe that a "robot," or "mechanical man" would develop a mind of its own and turn on its inventor?

The 1930s was an era of dread. The Great Depression had ravaged the nation economically, physically and emotionally. The fear of automation manifested itself in sensational pieces throughout various popular media about the invasion of the machine. Comic books, radio dramas and newspaper articles fueled the fire, and allowed the nation to point to something, anything. Robots, technology, automation, they were the cause of our distress.

Technology was something to fear because it would (or had) put you out of a job. Automation meant efficiency. Automation meant fewer jobs for men who worked in factories. Automation meant that we would never see an end to the despair. Sound familiar?

Assorted robots

Cynthia Breazeal's book on robots

Cynthia Breazeal

Maybe a new book this Christmas for robot lovers.

Robo World: The Story of Robot Designer Cynthia Breazeal

by 

Jordan D. Brown

ISBN-10: 0309095565
ISBN-13: 978-0309095563

Cynthia Breazeal [Wikipedia]

Mechanical robots of the past...they were supposed to be beneficial

The perfect bridge partner, Mr. Televox, the mechanical man, makes a fourth at the Huntington Hotel during the convention of the Pacific Coast Electrical Association in 1928. 

  "The Automatons of Yesteryear"

by

Katie Hiler

October 28th, 2013

The New York Times

The metallic monster had slanted, yellow eyes, skin like a suit of armor, and the halting, unsteady movements of one of Frankenstein’s creations. On a bright September day in 1928, a curious crowd of onlookers got their first glimpse of Eric the Robot. The mechanical man rose from his chair, stretched out an arm for silence, and made a speech, of which few people understood more than a few words. In a special cable to The New York Times, one reporter remarked on the event, held at the exhibition of the Model Engineer’s Society of London: “Of all orators, Eric seemed the coldest and most lacking in magnetism.”

While he may have been the first robot many Londoners had ever seen, Eric was just one of many humanoid machines on the scene in the early 20th century. Advances in technology and engineering had finally caught up with a human need to play God and create a man from metal parts – a desire stretching back at least as far as da Vinci’s “mechanical knight.”

In 1926, Westinghouse Electric Corporation introduced the world to Televox, a robot that could obey a human voice. Mr. Televox, as the public knew him, was followed by a number of other simple robots, including a humanoid known as Elektro (and his canine robo-companion, Sparko), which was exhibited at the 1940 World’s Fair. Many of these early robots were designed to perform crowd-pleasing tricks like smoking a cigarette, firing a revolver or whistling a tune. Most were just made of gears and levers, voiced and controlled by their Ozian creators behind the curtain.

But to R.J. Wensley, the engineer behind Televox, the modern robot was capable of more than just trivial entertainment – it could be put to real use. Televox was in many ways the product of a new approach to industry. The Industrial Revolution had nurtured the mind-set that machines could do some jobs better than men — more quickly, more accurately, and with greater safety.

At least three of Mr. Wensley’s robots were employed as substitutes for watchmen at reservoir substations across Washington, D.C. And he wasn’t ready to stop there. “In time to come the only work to be done by men and women will be that which requires faculties of discernment, discretion, and judgment,” Wensley was quoted as saying in 1933. “All other work – anything repetitive, routine, standardized – can better be done by machines.”

Yet even as technology was making robotic stand-ins for our most boring jobs a reality, scientists and engineers were already wondering whether it would be possible to invent a machine mind that could learn the human faculties that Mr. Wensley said set us apart.

Of course, to attach a robot to the computers of the 1960s — mainframes the size of entire rooms — would be laughable. And the human brain itself still resembled the dark, unexplored surface of a distant planet. The robotic brain will have to develop for years and years before the robotic body can merge with it.

Still, the unbounded imagination and deluded thinking of early robot makers, believing in the possibility of the technology of their time, laid the groundwork for today’s research. Many of the pioneers likely followed the credo of Thomas A. Edison, a father figure to so many American inventors, when he said in 1915: “To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk.” 


Assorted robots

Human empathy for robots, cyborgs, humanoids?

"Humans feel empathy for robots"

April 28th, 2013

SpaceDaily

 From the T-101 to Data from Star Trek, humans have been presented with the fictional dilemma of how we empathize with robots. Robots now infiltrate our lives, toys like Furbies or robot vacuum cleaners bring us closer, but how do we really feel about these non-sentient objects on a human level? A recent study by researchers at the University of Duisburg Essen in Germany found that humans have similar brain function when shown images of affection and violence being inflicted on robots and humans.

Astrid Rosenthal-von der Putten, Nicole Kramer, and Matthias Brand of the University of Duisburg Essen, will present their findings at the 63rd Annual International Communication Association conference in London. Rosenthal-von der Putten, Kramer and Brand conducted two studies.

In the first study, 40 participants watched videos of a small dinosaur-shaped robot that was treated in an affectionate or a violent way and measured their level of physiological arousal and asked for their emotional state directly after the videos. Participants reported to feel more negative watching the robot being abused and showed higher arousal during the negative video.

The second study conducted in collaboration with the Erwin L. Hahn Institute for Magnetic Resonance Imaging in Essen, used functional magnetic-resonance imaging (fMRI), to investigate potential brain correlations of human-robot interaction in contrast to human-human interaction.

The 14 participants were presented videos showing a human, a robot and an inanimate object, again being treated in either an affectionate or in a violent way.

Affectionate interaction towards both, the robot and the human, resulted in similar neural activation patterns in classic limbic structures, indicating that they elicit similar emotional reactions. However, when comparing only the videos showing abusive behavior differences in neural activity suggested that participants show more negative empathetic concern for the human in the abuse condition.

A great deal of research in the field of human-robot interaction concentrates on the implementation of emotion models in robotic systems. These studies test implementations with regard to their believability and naturalness, their positive influence on participants, or enjoyment of the interaction.

But there is little known on how people perceive "robotic" emotion and whether they react emotionally towards robots. People often have problems verbalizing their emotional state or find it strange to report on their emotions in human-robot interactions. Rosenthal-von der Putten and Kramer's study utilized more objective measures linked to emotion like physiological arousal and brain activity associated with emotional processing.

"One goal of current robotics research is to develop robotic companions that establish a long-term relationship with a human user, because robot companions can be useful and beneficial tools. They could assist elderly people in daily tasks and enable them to live longer autonomously in their homes, help disabled people in their environments, or keep patients engaged during the rehabilitation process," said Rosenthal-von der Putten.

"A common problem is that a new technology is exciting at the beginning, but this effect wears off especially when it comes to tasks like boring and repetitive exercise in rehabilitation. The development and implementation of uniquely humanlike abilities in robots like theory of mind, emotion and empathy is considered to have the potential to solve this dilemma."

"Investigation on Empathy Towards Humans and Robots Using Psychophysiological Measures and fMRI," by Astrid Rosenthal-von der Putten and Nicole Kramer; To be presented at the 63rd Annual International Communication Association Conference, London, England 17-21 June.

Would you feel badly if her arm fell off?

Old--new "Star Trek" philosophy 

 
Ethics: Robots, androids, and cyborgs

Robotic romance?

"Tomorrow’s Romantic Robots could Capture our Hearts"

by

Dick Pelletier

April 29th, 2012

Instititute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies

Although many today might find the idea of romance with a machine repulsive, experts predict that as the technology advances and robots become more human-like, we will view our silicon creations in a much friendlier light.

By 2025-to-2030, robots are expected to fill rolls as caregivers and servants, as well as avatars that manage our auto-drive cars, automated homes, and complex entertainment systems.

James Irvine and Sandra Schwarzbach, in a recent Futurist Magazine article, predict that the world will predominantly be driven by two fields: robotics and biotech. These areas will surpass information technologies by 2025, and dominate science research over the next 50 years.

Today’s machines can vacuum our homes, stand in as pets, explore planets, and assist in surgeries. Future ‘bots will do much more. Think brain-machine interfaces that allow handicapped patients to control prosthetic limbs. Or imagine swarms of mosquito-size flying ‘bots that can search collapsed buildings for trapped victims; and spy on terrorists holding people hostage, then relaying Intel back to authorities.

Technologies to build robots that perceive their surroundings, move themselves, and perform tasks without human oversight should reach fruition by 2030 or before, experts say. By 2035, our silicon friends could exhibit human-like consciousness with flesh-like skin; and possess traits vital for a loving partner.

Jason Nemeth, in his essay Should Robots Feel, believes love-companion robots will be practical in the future, and may one day satisfy all our intimate desires. Nemeth is not sure whether human/robot love will experience higher success rates than love between two humans, but he says tomorrow’s robots will unlock the possibilities, and a few bold humans willing to experiment will take it from there.

Carnegie Mellon’s Hans Moravec believes that by late 2020s, we will create robots in humanoid form, powered by fuel cells and cooled by a squeeze pump that beats like a heart with alcohol cooling its circuits. Robots would ‘drink wine’ for fuel, breathe air like us, and appear amazingly human-like.

Design tricks like these, along with soft ‘nanoskin’ will make tomorrow’s ‘bots seem uncannily human, encouraging us to perceive them as friends. Author Ray Kurzweil says tomorrow’s ‘droids could quickly learn to flesh out our positive feelings, providing an addictive allure almost impossible for us to resist.

David Levy, author of Love and Sex with Robots, predicts that as robots become more sophisticated, growing numbers of adventurous humans will enter into intimate relationships with these intelligent ‘bots.

A robot partner would be the perfect mate, never showing boredom or being inattentive, Levy says. You will always be the focus and centerpiece of their existence and you never need worry about their being unfaithful or going astray, because loyalty and being faithful are embedded in their programming.

What about the seamy side of, say, robo escorts. Would this be legal where human prostitution is not? Would we call it infidelity if a spouse indulges in robot passion? In addition, how will religious supporters react to confirmation that the deepest human thoughts and achievements can be duplicated in machines?

Levy doesn’t deny that romantic robots won’t pose problems. In fact, at first, robo-loving may only appeal to loners and misfits, he says; but that really shouldn’t matter. There are millions of lonely people without regular sex lives or relationships. A world where everyone has someone to love and to be loved would raise happiness levels everywhere. It could even be instrumental in achieving global peace.

However, there are robots rights issues to consider. Tomorrows ‘bots may prompt lawmakers to make it illegal to ‘turn off’ a robot without their permission. In addition, should robots and humans marry? If future robots can evoke true love, robo-human marriages might one day become legal and socially acceptable.

As wild as human-machine relationships might seem today, there are reasons to think that love and sex with robots will happen. Robots are already better in math, logic, chess, and games like Jeopardy. With an intelligent mind, and a beautiful sexy human-like body, these ‘bots could easily capture our hearts.

This romantic robot journey winds around unknown turns; but whether you love it or hate it; strong commercial support insures that this futuristic world will be ours to experience. Comments welcome.

 The all-singing, all-dancing female robot that can now be operated using just a mouse

Space...humans or robots

"Humans vs. Robots: Who Should Dominate Space Exploration?"

by

Adam Mann

April 11th, 2012

Wired

The most recent footprints on the moon are 40 years old, and the next artificial mark on the lunar surface will probably be made by a robot’s wheels rather than human soles.

Many space scientists, engineers and politicians argue that this is a good thing. Most astronomers will tell you that virtually anything a human can do on another planet, a robot can do, only cheaper and without the risk of losing a life. But the battle between humans and robots for the starring role in the next chapter of space exploration is not yet settled.

“In what was really only a few days on the lunar surface, the Apollo astronauts produced a tremendous scientific legacy,” said planetary scientist Ian Crawford of Birkbeck College in London, author of a paper in the April issue of Astronomy and Geophysics. “Robotic exploration of the moon and Mars pales in comparison.”

Robots have done all the recent planetary exploration in the solar system. In past decades, rovers, landers, and orbiters have visited the moon, asteroids and comets, every planet in the solar system and many of their moons as well. But how does their work compare to that of human astronauts?

In terms of sheer scientific output, manned exploration of outer space has a good track record. More than 2,000 papers have been published over the last four decades using data collected during the manned Apollo missions, and the rate of new papers is still rising. In comparison, the Soviet robotic Luna explorers and NASA’s Mars Exploration rover program — Mars Pathfinder, Spirit, and Opportunity — have each generated around 400 publications.

Humans hold a number of advantages over robots. They can make quick decisions in response to changing conditions or new discoveries, rather than waiting for time-delayed instructions from Earth. They are more mobile than current robot explorers: The Apollo 17 astronauts covered more than 22 miles in three days, a distance that has taken the Mars Opportunity rover eight years to match. Humans can drill for samples deep underground and deploy large-scale geologic instruments, something that no rover has achieved on another body.

Despite these qualities, many experts are skeptical of Crawford’s argument.

“I strongly disagree with his conclusions,” wrote engineer Adrian Stoica, who supervises the Advanced Robotic Controls group at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in an email to Wired. He notes that Crawford’s paper seems to focus on cost in terms of scientific output achieved.

The Apollo program was incredibly expensive — about $175 billion in today’s money — though it was not solely a scientific mission. It was mainly a geopolitical stunt during the Cold War to show American technological superiority over Russia, with science piggybacking on the ride.

The total amount spent on science over the Apollo missions, Crawford estimates, comes to about $2.09 billion in today’s dollars, making it comparable to or even cheaper than the recent $2.5 billion Mars Science Laboratory.

But contrasting manned lunar missions with robotic Mars missions is not the right way to go, wrote Stoica. A better analysis would use the potential cost of a manned Mars mission, which NASA estimates to be at least hundreds of billions of dollars.

Crawford counters that cost is not the biggest impetus behind his analysis. Instead, he wanted to bring attention to the sheer efficiency and legacy that the Apollo program achieved during its short time. If space exploration continues to focus on sending robots to other planets, “we will learn less about the solar system in the next 100 years than we will if we engage in an ambitious program of human exploration,” he said.

Of course, humans and robots each have their own advantages for exploration of outer space.

“There isn’t a battle between robots and humans — that’s comparing apples and oranges,” said James Garvin, chief scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “We send the robots as our pathfinders and scouts, and they open the frontiers so that we can decide where and when to send the people.”

Humans and robots already work together on Earth and in space. There are schemes that offer the advantages of human exploration without incurring as high of a cost.

“What makes robots at a distance inferior to humans is one thing only: latency,” said astronomer Dan Lester of the University of Texas at Austin.

The time it takes for a signal to travel from a robot back to mission control on Earth is a major stumbling block. Commands sent to a Mars rover take between 5 and 15 minutes. Light travel time to the moon is around 2.6 seconds.

“It takes 10 minutes to tie a knot with the Earth-moon latency,” said Lester. “But if we could bring that down to about 100 milliseconds, the robots themselves are very capable.” Teleoperated robots on the surface of another planet would have greater strength, endurance, and precision than human explorers, he added.

Teleoperation has been considered in the past for space exploration. During the Apollo era, the technology was not well developed but in the last decade, it has taken off. On Earth, surgeons in Baltimore now perform operations in Indonesia while officers in Nevada covertly spy on nuclear sites in Iran.

Lester envisions a future where astronauts camp out on Mars’ moons Phobos and Deimos and order remote-controlled robots to drive long distances over the planet’s surface, set up geologic instruments, and collect samples for analysis. He estimates this could greatly reduce costs because roughly half the price tag of a manned mission is spent on getting people down and back up the deep gravity well of a planet.

Crawford agrees such a plan would be a step beyond simply sending a robot, though perhaps less efficient than putting people on a planet’s surface.

“I think it will be strange to spend all the money to go all that way and then not land,” he said.

Bosko and his labor-saving creation

Bosko in this animated short tires of humdrum chores and creates a mechanical man to relieve him of the tasks.

Bosko [Wikipedia]

Bosko's Mechanical Man

1933

It walks, it talks, it even yodels...it's "Radio Man"

[Click to enlarge to read the copy.]

"Radio Man"

Popular Science

April 1939

Radio Man [officially called SABOR IV] was created by a Swiss engineer named August Huber. Ah, now the yodeling makes sense! He’s 7 feet tall and took 10 years to complete. It supposedly could walk, talk, sing, or yodel at his master’s command.It was supposedly powered by batteries hidden in the legs, but honestly, this makes me wonder if this was a work of fiction. Batteries in the legs? I thought that back in the 1930s it would have needed something like a truck filled with batteries to power it.

Disenfranchised from human contact?

"Japanese Firms Start Testing Robots In Office Buildings"

by

John Messina

February 7th, 2009

Electronic Devices / Robotics

It may not be too long before visitors are greeted by a robotic receptionist in Japanese Smart Office Buildings. Shimizu Corp and Yasukawa Electric Corp have opened the "Smart Showroom" that is part of the Smart Robotics Building Project, which will demonstrate the use of Smart Robots in intelligent buildings.

The project is designed to provide various services by combining building infrastructure technologies and robot technologies. Robots will take on the role of receptionist, guards, office cleaners, etc and replace humans. For example, in the role of a receptionist, they will greet visitors, attend to them and show them to their destination.

In the first step of the project, Shimizu Corp is responsible for the infrastructure technologies and Yasukawa Electric Corp developed the Smart Guide. In the Smart Showroom both companies, utilizing their technologies, demonstrates how the robot attends to visitors, takes care of all their needs, and sees them off.

This concept is not meant to rely on robots for all functions but would be a combination of all technologies with the intervention of humans for device control, information and telecommunication technologies. All this will be centrally located within the building so that the robots, operating in the building, can be tracked so that multiple robots can share work load in a large area.

We have enough trouble communicating with outsourced technical support systems and now we must interact with robotic receptionists, guards, office cleaners? Leave robotics to tedious and dangerous tasks.

Someday we may have to deal with...

The evil Dalek from Dr. Who

Ethics: Robots, androids, and cyborgs

There may come a time when robots, androids, and cyborgs will be more than science fiction and develop "intelligence" and with intelligence comes decision-making, freedom, responsibility--ETHICS.

One of the local television stations last night dug into its vaults and aired "Westworld" [MGM-1973] written and directed by Michael Crichton and staring Yul Brynner, Richard Benjamin, and James Brolin. An inexpensive film shot on studio back lots, dessert, and Harold Lloyd's estate, the film exploits dreams of a perfect fantasy vacation [at $1,000 a day] at an amusement facility called Delos where the paying adventurer can choose from Roman World, Medieval World, and Western World. Sophisticated androids are the counterparts of the human visitors and bend at the will of human interaction with NO harm to the humans. Well, maybe. Minor glitches happen which are expected in the complicated computer setup...normal malfunction parameters as expressed by a review board. It isn't much longer when the "glitches" become more complicated and numerous until finally there ensues android revolt--utter chaos. Humans are dying. Not a good thing for the investors of Delos...paid realism with deathly results. Yul Brynner [the gunslinger from the "Western World"] runs amuck, the scientists/programers are sealed in their room with locked doors and perish from asphyxiation, James Brolin dies for real in a shoot out with Yul Brynner, and the rest of the film is a quest by the gunslinger to get Richard Benjamin at all costs. Human ingenuity and reason finally foil the gunslinger, but the whole film, beyond its entertainment value, is the question of the rise of mechanical machines driven by computer programs and the establishment of ethical values. The film neither revealed why the androids changed [substandard, untested components?] and why they took an "evil" and "destructive" stance. Why not a stance of superior intelligence. That would have produced a film of little interest for sure. But the question remains as to the nature of the relationship of androids and the development of the fostering of ethical principals. Is the first stage of quality societal norms a function of a pool of negativity, antisocial behavior; that given time the androids would have evolved into positive, functioning members of their own "species" and interact well with other species? Where do ethical norms originate?

How about the penultimate android with an attitude problem and unshakeable pessimistic disposition--"Marvin, the Paranoid Android" equipped with "GPP" [Genuine People Personalities], from the very popular British TV series and the film "Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy". The story line is somewhat complex in this episodic tale but here is a good summation by Joseph DeMarco:

"Narrowly escaping the destruction of the earth to make way for an intergalatic freeway, hitchhikers Arthur Dent (Earthling Idiot) and Ford Prefect (Writer for the Guide) go on a crazy journey across time and space. They are read bad poetry which is considered terrible torture, and they are almost sucked out an air lock into space. After almost being killed many times, and narrowly escaping at the end of each chapter, they join forces with Zaphod Beeblebrox (A two-headed cocky alien), Trillian (another worthless earthling) and Marvin (the depressed robot) to search for the answer to the meaning of life, which may have been hidden on the recently demolished earth."

When you are contemplating this topic consider the character "Data" from "Star Trek: Next Generation", and recall the 1990 episode of "Star Trek: Next Generation" [#64] called "The Offspring" whereby Data has created a daughter called "Lal". Lal is capable of perception and feeling and given Data's "software" of ethics by "neural transfers". But Lal has some problems with citizens of the star ship. Befriended by Guinan she is introduced to the inhabitants of "Ten Forword" to broaden her social intercourse. Data and Captain Picard are embroiled in a discussion regarding Lal's removal from the star ship when they are interrupted by an emergency message from Counselor Troi. Lal is dying...her functions broke down after experiencing an extraordinary gamut of feelings in the counselor's presence. All attempts to save Lal fail and she succumbs to what we humans all must face--DEATH. Curiously, Lal's demise may have been contributed to a more advanced stage of sensitivity and she was unable to interface the new feelings with the supplied software. Consider Data's inability to experience the grief and emotion the crew feels at Lal's loss and must be content to have only memories of Lal. Data may well be equipped with a sense of ethics when dealing with human issues of loyalty, responsibility, self-sacrifice, etc., but he, and all androids of his caliber, may never fully integrate the full range of human emotions--well beyond the ethics.

Remember Isaac Asimov's "Three Laws of Robotics" which I assume would be relegated to androids too? All is fine until something breaks down or a truly unique circumstance arises that confounds even the best mind's of mankind.

1. A robot may not injure humans nor, through inaction, allow them to come to harm.

2. A robot must obey human orders except where such orders conflict with the First Law.

3. A robot must protect its own existence insofar as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second law.

Roger Clarke has written this detailed essay on Asimov's "laws of Robotics".

As I suspect...there will BE those unique events where Asimov's robot imperatives or any additional instructions will fail: "The freedom of fiction enabled Asimov to project the laws into many future scenarios; in so doing, he uncovered issues that will probably arise someday in real- world situations. Many aspects of the laws discussed in this article are likely to be weaknesses in any robotic code of conduct."

I suppose some wonder about definitions here. For example is there a clear cut distinction between robots and androids and another version--cyborgs. Maybe not, and all is a matter of semantics. And it may well be a fortuitous effort to make such a distinction other than what is common sense. Cyborgs and androids clearly take on the mantle of sentient beings whereas not all robots are merely drones of task oriented character such as Robbie the Robot [Forbidden Planet, "Lost In Space"] or "Marvin" ["Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy"]. And consider too that the discussion here is really existing within the realm of science fiction and certainly not correlated to any real life antecedents [yet], but is still worthy of discussion and analysis. The advent of sophisticated computers, biotechnology, genetics, etc. force us to become aware of the possibility of artificial devices becoming human like and subject to the same issues that humans face--those pesky ethical dilemmas. The development and integration of these new forms may just well be part of the whole picture of evolution as one writer suggested. Seeing the forest is impossible for us and thus humans may not realize that "humans" aren't the only form of life in a complex evolutionary scheme; that a carbon based sentient being is neither the end product of evolution nor the only species to embrace ethical issues.

Steve Mizrach offers this essay on cyborg ethics.

Now consider the notion that species ethics are non-transferable; that a species ethics is a category of one and implicitly forbids the overlapping of another category. In such a case the attribution [transfer] of ethical principles [involving servitude and safety of the primary or transferring species, i.e. Asimov's "Three Rules"] would be impossible for an android. This makes the ensuing comment: Each species is unique in its own ethics and only chance would afford similarity. Earth residents have one set of ethics while residents of some very distant planet would have theirs. A unique set for each species that except for chance could well exhibit diametrically opposed ethics. A learning bridge for the sharing of ethics just may not exist--or the simple transfer of ethics that ensures a species safety is impossible. Divergent species just may not have common grounds for mutual acceptance of ethics.

The notion of sound ethics stemming from religion/theology is not new and does carry some significance. [Unfortunately, on the whole, the implementation of such sound ethics has historically been short of world wide demonstration.] Now, whether an android community would adopt ethical norms [be they their own constructs or implanted or borrowed from other beings] to ensure the safety and perpetuation of their species is another mater. It would be arrogant, despite what may appear beneficial, to assume that mankind's ethical resolutions are the best for all species of intelligence or even the only set of ethics in the universe. Androids may discover that the "self" is the most beneficial status and one wonders just how long such a stance would last. Androids may have no community sense of ethics as we would understand. Ethics becomes twisted and inverted in substantial meaning to what we experience. You are quite correct in that survival of the individual and perpetuation of the species is what establishes a set of ethics. Most humans are guided by good ethics and do have a conscience. But you have to wonder just how far those great ethics are really understood and believed. There is no particular pleasure in killing another, but faced with a situation where food for one's survival is at issue, one would consider killing the intruder to sustain one's own existence. Maybe androids would have similar compunctions or maybe they have a different set of ethics that enable them to diffuse the life and death ethical situation.

"From the far horizons of the unknown come transcribed tales of new dimensions in time and space. These are stories of the future, adventures in which you'll live in a million could-be years on a thousand may-be worlds. The National Broadcasting Company in cooperation with Street & Smith, publishers of Astounding Science Fiction Magazine present: "X Minus One".

For you old time radio fans of yesteryear, X Minus One offered many episodes of robots, androids, humanoids, and the like, but one of the most delightful was an episode called "How To" [Episode #45 that aired April 3rd, 1956]. The story was by Clifford D. Simak, radio transcription was by William Welch, and stared Alan Bunce, Ann Seymour, Les Demon, Joe Bell, Jane Bruce, Santos Ortega, Ben Grauer. As the plot indicates: "A man orders a do-it-yourself robotic dog kit and is accidentally sent a kit for an experimental robot humanoid. The mechanical man is both a blessing and a curse." [Troy Holaday]. This has just about everything: Benevolent robots, counterfeiters, tax men, lawyers.

Let's suppose for the sake of the following argument that androids exist and that they have a set of ethics akin to man: A right to life [murder prohibited], mercy, altruism, etc.--including jurisprudence. Jurisprudence for androids?--yes. If they mirror human ethics of conduct, then they must also abide by the laws of human society and be subject to all of the ramifications.

Robert A. Freitas Jr. offers this essay on jurisprudence.

And finally..."Jennifer, an emotionally troubled whiz kid with obsessive-compulsive disorder, is desperate to find her birth mother in China. But she's also petrified to leave her house. So she uses her technological genius to build Jenny Chow, a surrogate devoid of dysfunction, to take the journey in her place."--New York Academy of Sciences.

A new play has opened called "The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow" by Rolin Jones and is concerned with a lonely young woman's [Jennifer Marcus] acute agoraphobia and genius who builds a companion--an android called Jenny Chow. While reviewer Charles Isherwood is dismayed at the overall tone of the play especially the whimsical demeanor of the android, it nevertheless illustrates the value of, shall we say, an alternate personality--far more complex and interactive than the standard doll or teddy bear of childhood. For those individuals that find it difficult or impossible to relate to "real" people or the "real" world such an android is not without merit for such an item will offer comfort, lessen loneliness, offer interaction on that person's level of communication and may possess value of therapy. Chemical sympathy may not be needed--just someone to talk to would be far more beneficial. life, which may have been hidden on the recently demolished earth.