The Robots of Dawn (Robot #3)

by Isaac Asimov

“The punishment of a murderer is psychic-probing, Partner Elijah, followed by the construction of a new personality. It is the personal structure of the mind that has committed the crime, not the life of the body.”

human beings are often illogical, Daneel. It is not an admirable characteristic.”

it seemed not that the Aurorans were growing more humane in their attitude out of a liking for the humane, but that they were denying the robotic nature of the objects in order to remove the discomfort of having to recognize the fact that the human beings were dependent upon objects of artificial intelligence.

History was interesting to the extent that it was catastrophic and, while that might make absorbing viewing, it made horrible living.

I know as well as you do that I myself am not attractive by Auroran standards. The trouble is that we cannot altogether control gene combinations and intrauterine influences. Nowadays, of course, with ectogenesis becoming more common—though I hope it shall never be as common as it is on Solaria—I would be eliminated in the late fetal stage.” “In which case, Dr. Fastolfe, the worlds would have lost a great theoretical roboticist.” “Perfectly correct,” said Fastolfe, without visible embarrassment, “but the worlds would never have known that, would they?—In

Are there Laws of Humanics as there are Laws of Robotics? How many Laws of Humanics might there be and how can they be expressed mathematically? I don’t know. “Perhaps, though, there may come a day when someone will work out the Laws of Humanics and then be able to predict the broad strokes of the future, and know what might be in store for humanity, instead of merely guessing as I do, and know what to do to make things better, instead of merely speculating. I dream sometimes of founding a mathematical science which I think of as ‘psychohistory,’ but I know I can’t and I fear no one ever will.”

To imitate a human brain, when I know almost nothing about the workings of the human brain, needs an intuitive leap—something that feels to me like poetry. And the same intuitive leap that would give me the humaniform positronic brain should surely give me a new access of knowledge about the human brain itself.

“I felt love for you, Elijah, because I thought you could feel love for me. I don’t say you loved me, but it seemed to me you could. I never had that and, although in ancient literature they talked of it, I didn’t know what they meant any more than when men in those same books talked about ‘honor’ and killed each other for its sake. I accepted the word, but never made out its meaning. I still haven’t. And so it was with ‘love’ until I touched you.

“In Aurora, sex was boring. It was accepted calmly, easily—as easily as breathing. If one felt the impulse, one reached out toward anyone who seemed suitable and, if that suitable person was not at the moment engaged in something that could not be put aside, sex followed in any fashion that was convenient. Like breathing. —But where is the ecstasy in breathing? If one were choking, then perhaps the first shuddering breath that followed upon deprivation might be an overwhelming delight and relief. But if one never choked? “And if one never unwillingly went without sex? If it were taught to youngsters on an even basis with reading and programming? If children were expected to experiment as a matter of course, and if older children were expected to help out?

He thought uncomfortably: A robot corpse is much more human than a human corpse.

these Aurorans were so unnecessarily garish in their interior decorations, so insistent in pretending they were living in a state of nature when they had tamed nature and broken it.

He was beginning to look upon the inconveniences—the occasional small bone, bit of gristle, strand of fiber, which might have repelled him earlier—as a bit of adventure.

For the first time in his life, Baley found himself envying a robot. Imagine being able to walk through that; to be indifferent to water, to sight, to sound; to be able to ignore surroundings and to have a pseudo-life that was absolutely courageous; to know no fear of pain or of death, because there was no pain or death. And yet to be incapable of originality of thought, to be incapable of unpredictable leaps of intuition— Were such gifts worth what humanity paid for them?

Sunlight—when viewed only as an alternative to the smooth, soft, warm, controlled light of the Cities—could only be considered harsh and uncertain. But compare it with the storm and it was the promise of peace itself.