1950, I, Robot Is Sometimes Referred to Book Report

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1950, I, Robot is sometimes referred to as a novel, but it is a collection of short stories written over a ten-year period, all but one having appeared in Astounding magazine. There are several characters that do appear in most of the stories, and Asimov had also written connecting passages in order for them to have a more cohesive and episodic flow. The book tells the history of U.S. Robots and Mechanical Men.

In one of the stories, "Little Lost Robot," it is Susan Calvin who is called upon to find the solution. In her first venture away from Earth she travels to HyperBase, where robots and human engineers are endeavoring to create a "hyperatomic" propulsion system in an effort to launch the first interstellar voyages. Due to hazardous radiation conditions necessary for the project the robots' adherance to the Three Laws have been supressed, since before they had been compelled to rescue the human engineers from certain experimental conditions (due to the first law). One engineer, in a fit of pique against a troublesome robot, tells the machine to "Get lost!" Uncapable of doing anything but take the human order literally, the robot "loses" himself among sixty-two other robots of identical manufacture. The possibility of the news of robots who do not conform to the Three Laws reaching Earth makes the discovery of the lost robot of utmost importance. So, the humans got the robots to do the work and to allow the humans to certain levels of radiation by supressing the Three Laws.

Asimov is more highly regarded for the intellectual puzzles he presented in these and other stories rather than for character development. The best story in this collection is one of the exceptions to that rule. "Liar!" presents a vivid portrait of Susan Calvin, a shy and sensitive woman who has devoted her whole life to the understanding of the psychology of the positronic brain of the robot.

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In this story we discover she is also quite susceptible to the human emotions of love, vanity, jealousy, and anger. The focus this time is on the robot Herbie, who happens to be able to read the minds of his human creators. Due to the restrictions of the First Law, Herbie is forced to lie to them since he knows what they are thinking and that the truth will hurt their feelings. He is unable to tell Lanning and Bogert about the stage in his manufacture that caused his unique condition since the truth of a robot solving the puzzle would harm their self-esteem. The lie he tells Susan Calvin is that the man she secretly admires, Milton Ashe, is actually in love with her. The fact that the lies harm the humans as much as the truth causes Herbie to withdraw into a catatonic state, unable to reconcile his actions with his understanding of the Three Laws.

In the majority of the stories the robots described are mechanical constructs of different designs, with various improvements and innovations incorporated into each successive generation. The last two stories in the book, "Evidence" and "The Evitable Conflict," present the possibility of a robot with a human appearance. The character of Stephen Byerly is a judge and a candidate for mayor of a large metropolitan city. His opponent is convinced he is a robot constructed to replace the original Byerly, who had been the victim of a tragic accident years before. The fact that Byerly refuses to undergo certain tests to prove or disprove this assertion does not bode well for his case. His defense….....

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