Isaac Asimov: Reason I

Imagine Artificial Intelligence

Divyajyoti Singh

Issac Asimov (1920- 1992) has been hailed as the master of Science fiction genre. He claimed to have coined the word ‘robotics’ to describe the study of robots. He has been recognized as the ‘father of the modern robot story’ inventing robots having superior intelligences. He envisaged industrial robots with built-in safety features catering to specialized tasks fifty years before the Japanese actually used the ‘robots’ to ‘man’ their assembly lines. The Complete Robot was published in 1982 but even before this event Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics had caught the scientific imagination.

In Isaac Asimov’s stories the machines are not merely devices that accomplish tasks or help processes but advanced robots that simulate human behaviour. It would be proper to say that these robots have evolved (rather than developed) from primitive robots much as humans have evolved from primates or primitive men. In Asimov’s fiction the robots have ‘positronic’ brain circuits that grant them an artificial intelligence that is comparable to human intelligence and at times seems to even surpass human wit.

The great intellect of robot, coupled with the physical characteristics, make it an excellent servant, a capable colleague but an intimidating rival. It remains an androcentric (human centered) world where robots have been granted intelligence so that they can serve human purposes and ends- where human ends are great and the task mammoth the intelligence of the robot is required to match it. Robots are used as human substitutes where there may be constant physical and mental risk involved, along with constant physical and mental effort. The robot intelligence is needed and appreciated till it serves human ends but when this intelligence starts to explore its own limits it is perceived as threatening.

How artificial intelligence is controlled so that robots are intelligent enough to understand human commands, take independent decisions benefiting humans, carry out sophisticated operations but cannot consider their own interests? This is guaranteed by the Three Laws of Robotics that build good healthy slave complexes in the robots. The three laws installed into every intelligent robot’s brain ensure that the robot should never allow a human to be harmed, take orders from humans, and sacrifice their own life for humans. The laws induce mental slavery and create a relationship of inequality between the humans and robots.

In Asimov’s story ‘Runaround’ there is no dissent but in ‘Reason’ the robot starts questioning the human claim to superiority. In ‘Reason’ the robot is a highly evolved creature that depicts curiosity as to its own existence much like the Biblical Adam or the first human on earth. He tries to reason the cause of his existence and comes to the Cartesian conclusion: ‘I think, therefore I am’ or cogito ergo sum. This is an axiom that Rene Descartes, the famous mathematician and philosopher contributed to the philosophy of the world. The robot without text book help reasons things out. This is true of human genius and thus the robot intelligence in ‘Reason’ is equivalent to the intelligence of the best human brains. The humans, especially Donovan, cannot accept this inquisitiveness in a robot and try to mock it. At times, the currents of sympathy flow between humans and robots but the difficulty in emotional attachment is apparent because the humans cannot really connect to metallic touch and have difficulty reading the blank faces of the robots. The robots are capable of emotions in their own way but they are stoic and calm in comparison to humans. The three laws make robots extraordinarily sensitive to human feelings but they do not sense the crises as humans sense it. It is a human-centric and earth-centric world although the settings are extra-terrestrial and characters are humans as well as robots because the situations that are described have relevance from human point of view. The robot point of view is also visible but human angle reigns supreme. The reason for robots’ creation is so that they can mange the extra-terrestrial colonies of humans. The readers too, being human, tend to side with humans when there is contest because, eventually, the contest between man-machine becomes a matter of our survival. Sympathy for robots may sometimes be felt but, naturally, is never completely replaces the sympathy for humans. In fact, we most sympathize with the robots where they are most like humans and not when they are like machines.

The stories are hinged on critical situations which allow us to witness the interplay of human and robot intelligence. Despite the physical and mental prowess of robots, the humans are decisively the masters. The hallmark of human intelligence is their adeptness in handling crises. The humans comprehend the situations from a vantage point; they have preceded the robots so they have already reasoned out things for themselves, they have superior information, they have common sense along with specialist knowledge, the overarching three laws favour them and the implications of tasks and processes to be performed is clear to them. The robot slaves and executives are subordinate managers to human mangers.

The three laws are designed to resolve every potential problem impasse, deadlock or crises in human favourite laws show human intelligence in predicting and anticipating crises and finding ways to manage them. The antique robots in ‘Runaround’ lack spontaneity and original thinking, they have slave mentality, slow wit and slow reflexes. Speedy, advanced by ten years is more sophisticated but retains the slave mentality. The robots in ‘Runaround’ are not able to comprehend or sense the crises. The volcanic ashes adversely affect Speedy’s reflexes bringing him to a state that is robotic equivalent of human drunkenness. He utters gibberish and poetic verses being oblivious of the imminent threat to human life. It turns out that this situation arises because there was a lack of urgency in Donovan’s instructions to the robot to fetch the selenium. Selenium was required to recharge photocells in the photocell bank at the station. The energy of these cells was used to keep the station cool. As they are not replenished humans are in immediate danger of perishing. The robots problem is diagnosed and traced to false equilibriums set between the laws of robotics that keep the robot engaged in a runaround the selenium pool. The robots need constant human monitoring and act as helps rather than principals. The crises arises because of dangerous and unpredictable equilibrium set between the three laws (at different times) and are resolved after being apprehended by humans who show how divergent thinking can help resolve crises- in crises there are various solutions of varying efficacy. The robots are not able to explore these multiple ways. This incapacity may be nurtured by the three laws rather than some intrinsic lack of intelligence.