“Sure you can,” said Gold. “How about an over-populated world in which robots are taking over human jobs?” “Too depressing,” I said. “I’m not sure I want to handle a heavy sociological story.” “Do it your way. You like mysteries. Put a murder in such a world and have a detective solve it with a robot partner. If the detective doesn’t solve it, the robot will replace him.” That struck fire. Campbell had often said that a science-fiction mystery story was a contradiction in terms; that advances in technology could be used to get detectives out of their difficulties unfairly, and that the readers
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