Asimov's Future History Volume 3

by Isaac Asimov

  “But you are not a slave. You are a perfectly good robot — a genius of a robot, I am given to understand, capable of an artistic expression that can be matched nowhere. What more could you do if you were free?”

  “Perhaps no more than I do now, Your Honor, but with greater joy. It has been said in this courtroom that only a human being can be free. It seems to me that only someone who wishes for freedom can be free. I wish for freedom.”

  And it was that statement that cued the judge. The crucial sentence in his decision was “There is no right to deny freedom to any object with a mind advanced enough to grasp the concept and desire the state.” It was eventually upheld by the World Court.

  8

  SIR REMAINED DISPLEASED, and his harsh voice made Andrew feel as if he were being short-circuited. “I don’t want your damned money, Andrew. I’ll take it only because you won’t feel free otherwise. From now on, you can select your own jobs and do them as you please. I will give you no orders, except this one: Do as you please. But I am still responsible for you. That’s part of the court order. I hope you understand that.”

  Little Miss interrupted. “Don’t be irascible, Dad. The responsibility is no great chore. You know you won’t have to do a thing. The Three Laws still hold.”

  “Then how is he free?”

  “Are not human beings bound by their laws, Sir?” Andrew replied.

  “I’m not going to argue.” Sir left the room, and Andrew saw him only infrequently after that.

  Little Miss came to see him frequently in the small house that had been built and made over for him. It had no kitchen, of course, nor bathroom facilities. It had just two rooms; one was a library and one was a combination storeroom and workroom. Andrew accepted many commissions and worked harder as a free robot than he ever had before, till the cost of the house was paid for and the structure was signed over to him.

  One day Little Sir — no, “George!” — came. Little Sir had insisted on that after the court decision. “A free robot doesn’t call anyone Little Sir,” George had said. “I call you Andrew. You must call me George.”

  His preference was phrased as an order, so Andrew called him George — but Little Miss remained Little Miss.

  One day when George came alone, it was to say that Sir was dying. Little Miss was at the bedside, but Sir wanted Andrew as well.

  Sir’s voice was still quite strong, though he seemed unable to move much. He struggled to raise his hand.

  “Andrew,” he said, “Andrew — Don’t help me, George. I’m only dying; I’m not crippled. Andrew, I’m glad you’re free. I just wanted to tell you that.”

  Andrew did not know what to say. He had never been at the side of someone dying before, but he knew it was the human way of ceasing to function. It was an involuntary and irreversible dismantling, and Andrew did not know what to say that might be appropriate. He could only remain standing, absolutely silent, absolutely motionless.

  When it was over, Little Miss said to him, “He may not have seemed friendly to you toward the end, Andrew, but he was old, you know; and it hurt him that you should want to be free.”

  Then Andrew found the words. “I would never have been free without him, Little Miss.”

  9

  ONLY AFTER SIR’S death did Andrew begin to wear clothes. He began with an old pair of trousers at first, a pair that George had given him.

  George was married now, and a lawyer. He had joined Feingold’s firm. Old Feingold was long since dead, but his daughter had carried on. Eventually the firm’s name became Feingold and Martin. It remained so even when the daughter retired and no Feingold took her place. At the time Andrew first put on clothes, the Martin name had just been added to the firm.

  George had tried not to smile the first time he saw Andrew attempting to put on trousers, but to Andrew’s eyes the smile was clearly there. George showed Andrew how to manipulate the static charge to allow the trousers to open, wrap about his lower body, and move shut. George demonstrated on his own trousers, but Andrew was quite aware it would take him a while to duplicate that one flowing motion.

  “But why do you want trousers, Andrew? Your body is so beautifully functional it’s a shame to cover it especially when you needn’t worry about either temperature control or modesty. And the material doesn’t cling properly — not on metal.”

  Andrew held his ground. “Are not human bodies beautifully functional, George? Yet you cover yourselves.”

  “For warmth, for cleanliness, for protection, for decorativeness. None of that applies to you.”

  “I feel bare without clothes. I feel different, George,” Andrew responded.

  “Different! Andrew, there are millions of robots on Earth now. In this region, according to the last census, there are almost as many robots as there are men.”

  “I know, George. There are robots doing every conceivable type of work.”

  “And none of them wear clothes.”

  “But none of them are free, George.”

  Little by little, Andrew added to his wardrobe. He was inhibited by George’s smile and by the stares of the people who commissioned work.

  He might be free, but there was built into Andrew a carefully detailed program concerning his behavior to people, and it was only by the tiniest steps that he dared advance; open disapproval would set him back months. Not everyone accepted Andrew as free. He was incapable of resenting that, and yet there was a difficulty about his thinking process when he thought of it. Most of all, he tended to avoid putting on clothes — or too many of them — when he thought Little Miss might come to visit him. She was older now and was often away in some warmer climate, but when she returned the first thing she did was visit him.

  On one of her visits, George said, ruefully, “She’s got me, Andrew. I’ll be running for the legislature next year. `Like grandfather,’ she says, `like grandson.’”

  “Like grandfather …” Andrew stopped, uncertain.

  “I mean that I, George, the grandson, will be like Sir, the grandfather, who was in the legislature once.”

  “It would be pleasant, George, if Sir were still —” He paused, for he did not want to say, “in working order.” That seemed inappropriate.

  “Alive;” George said. “Yes, I think of the old monster now and then, too.”

  Andrew often thought about this conversation. He had noticed his own incapacity in speech when talking with George. Somehow the language had changed since Andrew had come into being with a built-in vocabulary. Then, too, George used a colloquial speech, as Sir and Little Miss had not. Why should he have called Sir a monster when surely that word was not a appropriate. Andrew could not even turn to his own books for guidance. They were old, and most dealt with woodworking, with art, with furniture design. There were none on language, none on the ways of human beings.

  Finally, it seemed to him that he must seek the proper books; and as a free robot, he felt he must not ask George. He would go to town and use the library. It was a triumphant decision and he felt his electro potential grow distinctly higher until he had to throw in an impedance coil.

  He put on a full costume, including even a shoulder chain of wood. He would have preferred the glitter plastic, but George had said that wood was much more appropriate, and that polished cedar was considerably more valuable as well.

  He had placed a hundred feet between himself and the house before gathering resistance brought him to a halt. He shifted the impedance coil out of circuit, and when that did not seem to help enough he returned to his home and on a piece of notepaper wrote neatly, “I have gone to the library,” and placed it in clear view on his worktable.

  10

  ANDREW NEVER QUITE got to the library.

  He had studied the map. He knew the route, but not the appearance of it. The actual landmarks did not resemble the symbols on the map and he would hesitate. Eventually, he thought he must have somehow gone wrong, for everything looked strange.

  He passed an occasional field-robo
t, but by the time he decided he should ask his way none were in sight. A vehicle passed and did not stop.

  Andrew stood irresolute, which meant calmly motionless, for coming across the field toward him were two human beings.

  He turned to face them, and they altered their course to meet him. A moment before, they had been talking loudly. He had heard their voices. But now they were silent. They had the look that Andrew associated with human uncertainty; and they were young, but not very young. Twenty, perhaps? Andrew could never judge human age.

  “Would you describe to me the route to the town library, sirs?”

  One of them, the taller of the two, whose tall hat lengthened him still farther, almost grotesquely, said, not to Andrew, but to the other, “It’s a robot.”

  The other had a bulbous nose and heavy eyelids. He said, not to Andrew but to the first, “It’s wearing clothes.”

  The tall one snapped his fingers. “It’s the free robot. They have a robot at the old Martin place who isn’t owned by anybody. Why else would it be wearing clothes?”

  “Ask it,” said the one with the nose.

  “Are you the Martin robot?” asked the tall one.

  “I am Andrew Martin, sir,” Andrew said.

  “Good. Take off your clothes. Robots don’t wear clothes.” He said to the other, “That’s disgusting. Look at him!”

  Andrew hesitated. He hadn’t heard an order in that tone of voice in so long that his Second Law circuits had momentarily jammed.

  The tall one repeated, “Take off your clothes. I order you.”

  Slowly, Andrew began to remove them.

  “Just drop them,” said the tall one.

  The nose said, “If it doesn’t belong to anyone, it could be ours as much as someone else’s.”

  “Anyway,” said the tall one, “who’s to object to anything we do. We’re not damaging property.” tie turned to Andrew. “Stand on your head.” “The head is not meant-” Andrew began.

  “That’s an order. If you don’t know how, try anyway.”

  Andrew hesitated again, then bent to put his head on the ground. He tried to lift his legs but fell, heavily.

  The tall one said, “Just lie there.” He said to the other, “We can take him apart. Ever take a robot apart?”

  “Will he let us?”

  “How can he stop us?”

  There was no way Andrew could stop them, if they ordered him in a forceful enough manner not to resist The Second Law of obedience took precedence over the Third Law of self-preservation. In any case, he could not defend himself without possibly hurting them, and that would mean breaking the First Law. At that thought, he felt every motile unit contract slightly and he quivered as he lay there.

  The tall one walked over and pushed at him with his foot. “He’s heavy. I think we’ll need tools to do the job.”

  The nose said, “We could order him to take himself, apart. It would be fun to watch him try.”

  “Yes,” said the tall one, thoughtfully, “but let’s get him off the road. If someone comes along —”

  It was too late. Someone had, indeed, come along and it was George. From where he lay, Andrew had seen him topping a small rise in the middle distance. He would have liked to signal him in some way, but the last order had been “Just lie there!”

  George was running now, and he arrived on the scene somewhat winded. The two young men stepped back a little and then waited thoughtfully.

  “Andrew, has something gone wrong?” George asked, anxiously.

  Andrew replied, “I am well, George.”

  “Then stand up. What happened to your clothes?”

  “That your robot, Mac?” the tall young man asked.

  George turned sharply. “He’s no one’s robot. What’s been going on here.”

  “We politely asked him to take his clothes off. What’s that to you, if you don’t own him.”

  George turned to Andrew. “What were they doing, Andrew?”

  “It was their intention in some way to dismember me. They were about to move me to a quiet spot and order me to dismember myself.”

  George looked at the two young men, and his chin trembled.

  The young men retreated no farther. They were smiling.

  The tall one said, lightly, “What are you going to do, pudgy? Attack us?”

  George said, “No. I don’t have to. This robot has been with my family for over seventy-five years. He knows us and he values us more than he values anyone else. I am going to tell him that you two are threatening my life and that you plan to kill me. I will ask him to defend me. In choosing between me and you two, he will choose me. Do you know what will happen to you when he attacks you?”

  The two were backing away slightly, looking uneasy.

  George said, sharply, “Andrew, I am in danger and about to come to harm from these young men. Move toward them!”

  Andrew did so, and the young men did not wait. They ran.

  “All right, Andrew, relax,” George said. He looked unstrung. He was far past the age where he could face the possibility of a dustup with one young man, let alone two.

  “I couldn’t have hurt them, George: I could see they were not attacking you.”

  “I didn’t order you to attack them. I only told you to move toward them. Their own fears did the rest.”

  “How can they fear robots?”

  “It’s a disease of mankind, one which has not yet been cured. But never mind that. What the devil are you doing here, Andrew? Good thing I found your note. I was just on the point of turning back and hiring a helicopter when I found you. How did you get it into your head to go to the library? I would have brought you any books you needed”

  “I am a —” Andrew began.

  “Free robot. Yes, yes. All right, what did you want in the library?”

  “I want to know more about human beings, about the world, about everything. And about robots, George. I want to write a history about robots.”

  George put his arm on the other’s shoulder. “Well, let’s walk home. But pick up your clothes first. Andrew, there are a million books on robotics and all of them include histories of the science. The world is growing saturated not only with robots but with information about robots.”

  Andrew shook his head, a human gesture he had lately begun to adopt. “Not a history of robotics, George. A history of robots, by a robot. I want to explain how robots feel about what has happened since the first ones were allowed to work and live on Earth.”

  George’s eyebrows lifted, but he said nothing in direct response.

  11

  LITTLE MISS WAS just past her eighty-third birthday, but there was nothing about her that was lacking in either energy or determination. She gestured with her cane oftener than she propped herself up with it.

  She listened to the story in a fury of indignation. “George, that’s horrible. Who were those young ruffians?”

  “I don’t know. What difference does it make? In the end they did not do any damage.”

  “They might have. You’re a lawyer, George; and if you’re well off, it’s entirely due to the talents of Andrew. It was the money he earned that is the foundation of everything we have. He provides the continuity for this family, and I will not have him treated as a wind-up toy.”

  “What would you have me do, Mother?” George asked.

  “I said you’re a lawyer. Don’t you listen? You set up a test case somehow, and you force the regional courts to declare for robot rights and get the legislature to pass the necessary bills. Carry the whole thing to the World Court, if you have to. I’ll be watching, George, and I’ll tolerate no shirking.”

  She was serious, so what began as a way of soothing the fearsome old lady became an involved matter with enough legal entanglement to make it interesting. As senior partner of Feingold and Martin, George plotted strategy. But he left the actual work to his junior partners, with much of it a matter for his son, Paul, who was also a member of the firm and who reported duti
fully nearly every day to his grandmother. She, in turn, discussed the case every day with Andrew.

  Andrew was deeply involved. His work on his book on robots was delayed again, as he pored over the legal arguments and even, at times, made very diffident suggestions.

  “George told me that day I was attacked that human beings have always been afraid of robots,” he said one day. “As long as they are, the courts and the legislatures are not likely to work hard on behalf of robots. Should not something be done about public opinion?”

  So while Paul stayed in court, George took to the public platform. It gave him the advantage of being informal, and he even went so far sometimes as to wear the new, loose style of clothing which he called drapery.

  Paul chided him, “Just don’t trip over it on stage, Dad.”

  George replied, despondently, “I’ll try not to.”

  He addressed the annual convention of holo-news editors on one occasion and said, in part: “If, by virtue of the Second Law, we can demand of any robot unlimited obedience in all respects not involving harm to a human being, then any human being, any human being, has a fearsome power over any robot, any robot. In particular, since Second Law supersedes Third Law; any human being can use the law of obedience to overcome the law of self-protection. He can order any robot to damage itself or even to destroy itself for any reason, or for no reason.

  “Is this just? Would we treat an animal so? Even an inanimate object which had given us good service has a claim on our consideration. And a robot is not insensitive; it is not an animal. It can think well enough so that it can talk to us, reason with us, joke with us. Can we treat them as friends, can we work together with them, and not give them some of the fruits of that friendship, some of the benefits of co-working?

  “If a man has the right to give a robot any order that does not involve harm to a human being, he should have the decency never to give a robot any order that involves harm to a robot, unless human safety absolutely requires it. With great power goes great responsibility, and if the robots have Three Laws to protect men, is it too much to ask that men have a law or two to protect robots?”