I’m not an Autobot, I’m an Atheist

I’ve just finished Fabels for Robots by Stanislaw Lem. What a ride. Intergalactic electroknights, the creation of the universe, mad robotic philosophy struggling to come to grips with the gulf between the natural and the artificial.

It basically read as a compilation of parables from the Transformers’ religious texts.

And thusly…

Autobots believe the universe was created by giant Gigant spinning as he sought to catch tiny Mocrox. They believe it is good to goad others into constructive labor and they tend to cherish tiny things (as in their children’s story “The Advisers of King Hydrops”). Autobots like humans for this reason. (splinter groups such as the micromasters are generally considered a bit nutty).

“Decepticon” is a catch-all for non-autobot, similar to medieval English “infidel.” There are many non-autobot faiths including:

The Nullificatiobists, who believe that growth and discovery will eventually stifle the universe if not balanced by death and destruction.

The Artificers, who believe nature is disgusting and evil, and only artificial things (objects created by sapience) are good. Humans, therefor, are a necessary step in the evolution of purer forms of sapience from unthinking natural matter. As such they are inherently flawed — the nature above which Robot was meant to rise.

Polycosmogeners of many stripes are united only by the belief that there have been many robot-making beings through history. The ones that came to Earth tend to believe e humans are immoral (practically if not inherently), since they create machines to be their slaves.

And many irreligious robots hate and fear humans because they are afraid that our associated ecology with its oxygen and water will cause them to rust.