Isaac Asimov's I, Robot: To Preserve

by Mickey Zucker Reichert

  “Suit malfunction.” Lawrence simplified, probably more for listeners than Susan. “Robots don’t need oxygen, and they can work in extremes of temperature, so they didn’t realize the need for assistance. Of course, once they were commanded, the Second Law kicked in. The astronaut was whisked to safety, the robots were better educated, and we had no further difficulties.” He added carefully, “Of that type, at least.”

  Susan knew the Mercury mission had been plagued by problems, most of which had nothing to do with the robots. With temperatures ranging from 280 degrees below zero to 800 degrees above, it was hardly the most hospitable planet for human exploration. She took the logical leap. “So, it might just be possible that Nate witnessed the murder if he did not realize the killer’s motive. In other words, he saw no danger in a human carrying a tool; and, by the time it was used to crush Dr. Goldman’s skull, it was too late to intervene.” Susan continued thinking aloud. “And, at that point, the Three Laws would force him to do three things: one, try to prevent the victim from dying; two, protect any other persons in the room; and, three, protect the killer himself from harm. Because the First Law doesn’t discriminate between human beings?” It was as much a question as an observation.

  “Of course not,” Lawrence pointed out amicably, “because it’s the job of a robot to remain subservient to all of humanity.” He added, “Although, that’s not to say it wouldn’t rank those three priorities in order based on . . . knowledge and experience. The fact that one person in the room had already shown himself willing and able to kill would become a part of any decision making.”

  Susan thought back to when two Cadmium agents had broken into USR, threatening her, Lawrence, Detective Jake Carson, and Kendall Stevens, a fellow psychiatry resident. Both sides had fired many gunshots, placing Nate in multiple, untenable positions. Susan knew Jake and the agents were too well trained for anyone or anything to disarm them. Is it possible Nate could have taken the gun from me at some point but realized, if he intervened, the agent would have lived at the expense of Lawrence and me, at least? Was there a point at which Nate could have thrown himself in front of a bullet but realized that sacrificing himself would have negatively changed the outcome of the battle? Susan could not think of a specific moment when Nate could have acted differently and saved a life without forfeiting more. However, she also knew that at no point did she ever worry about his loyalties. Should I have? It was a question she could spend a long time pondering in the future, but she knew she would not need to. Nate posed no harm to her under any circumstances. She felt more sure of that than she did about any human in the universe.

  Lawrence glanced around, as if worried someone might burst in on them in a delicate moment. Susan hoped he realized they were probably being unobtrusively observed. “Susan, do you think it’s possible someone tricked Nate?”

  Susan did not understand the question. “Tricked him?” She pondered further. “You mean into committing murder without realizing it?”

  Lawrence bobbed his head, but only once, and leaned forward conspiratorially, still clutching his coffee. “For example, what if someone befriended Nate. Every day for months, they played a game where he swung a hammer through the air or at a nail, always safely. Then, a blindfold became part of the game.”

  The suggestion was so ludicrous, Susan laughed out loud until Lawrence’s wounded look stopped her. “Lawrence, that’s insane. There’s no way Nate would allow himself to be blindfolded with a heavy implement in his hands, even if only because he might crush the finger of someone holding the nail. He cannot harm a human being. Period.”

  “Maybe if someone convinced him he was hammering a nail, then switched the situation somehow . . .” Lawrence was fishing.

  Susan gave him that much. Perhaps there was some twisted scenario in which a brilliant, thinking machine could be duped into performing an action without realizing the consequences, but this did not seem like a possible one. “Too complicated and perverse, Lawrence. Anything that required weeks or months of preparation would risk Nate telling one of us about it. I can’t see Dr. Goldman going along with it, especially if it was presented as a prank or a game. Peters, maybe, but not Goldman.”

  “Yeah.”

  Susan continued. “Far more likely a human being murdered Dr. Goldman and framed Nate. The robot’s constraints and naïveté would make it an easy target.”

  “Yeah,” Lawrence repeated. He glanced at his coffee, probably gone cold. “Which brings us to the only logical reality: Nate witnessed the murder but couldn’t stop it.”

  Now it was Susan’s turn to say, “Yeah.” She already knew the Frankenstein Complex had forced USR to make its robots wholly subservient, to make the protection of their own existence, their own survival, a distant third to defending and slavishly serving their human masters. “A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.” Then, “a robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.” Only after those conditions were met could a robot consider the Third Law: “A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.” It might have rendered Nate a sitting duck; yet it made him wholly safe to people, exactly what the human race wanted and insisted upon.

  “So why won’t Nate tell the police what he witnessed?”

  Susan had to admit she had no idea.

  • • •

  The single occupant of the six-by-eight-foot cell sat cross-legged on the concrete floor, face buried in his hands. He still wore the casual khakis Susan had noticed in the laboratory, and his blue polo had splatters of blood. She felt certain the police had emptied every pocket. Had she not known his identity, she could never have guessed it. Unlike the brisk and friendly robot who had become her best friend, the figure in the cell appeared dejected and eerily still. Though their footsteps echoed through the hallway, and Detective Riviera guided Susan and Lawrence verbally, Nate did not even raise his head at their approach.

  “Nate,” Lawrence said.

  There was no response from the cell. Nate could just as well have been a statue.

  Lawrence glanced at Susan, who tried, “Nate, it’s me, Susan.”

  Still, the figure in the cell did not move.

  A thought struck Susan, and she wondered why she had never considered it before. “Does Nate have an Off switch?” She had never seen him in a dormant state, but she did not always find him when she looked for him, either. Lawrence had once mentioned that positronic robots required an energy source in order to maintain their function and memories.

  “Not a switch per se.” Lawrence studied the robot, apparently assessing his physical status. “But the battery does need occasional updating.” He stepped closer to the bars and spoke in a commanding tone. “N8-C, look at me!”

  In slow increments, the robot’s head lifted until the eyes appeared just above the fingers. They were not the sweet brown orbs with which Susan had become so familiar. Now they looked drawn and haunted.

  Lawrence addressed the detective. “You say he hasn’t been answering your questions.”

  “That’s right.” The detective kept his attention fixed on Nate. “In fact, that’s the most he’s moved in at least an hour.”

  “How have you been asking?”

  The detective went on the defensive. “The usual way. We read him his rights first.”

  Lawrence shook his head impatiently. “That’s not my concern. I’m not a lawyer, and robots don’t have rights anyway. No matter how human one might appear, it’s still an object, a tool. You no more have to Mirandize him than you do a bridge that collapsed or a piano that fell on someone’s head. He does only what he’s been told or programmed to do.” He returned to his original point. “The Second Law states that a robot must obey orders given it by human beings. I’m just wondering if you simply ask
ed him or actually commanded him.”

  Susan considered Lawrence’s words. Her first reaction, dismay, quickly faded as she realized the truth behind his statements. So many videos and shows had contemplated the humanity, the entitlements and privileges of cyborgs, she could not help considering them just and civil rights. Yet a line needed to be drawn before positronic robots became commonplace, to prevent a “conception” debate from dividing and crippling the country in the same way abortion had in the twentieth century.

  Putting aside her love for Nate and John Calvin, Susan had to submit to Lawrence’s point that the dividing line was the brain itself. Anything with a human brain was human; anything with an artificial brain, including the wonder that was the positronic brain, was not. To do otherwise might permanently destroy the robotics industry. United States Robots was not God, and what it created was not life, only a facsimile. Recycling a robot must never be considered murder. She could imagine larger hordes of protesters exhorting USR than Manhattan Hasbro. Most would demand its closure. Others would insist that every brain, no matter how damaged, must be salvaged and kept “alive.” The Frankenstein Complex, Susan realized, had an even more evil twin, the Belgar Complex, named for a sympathetic robot in a sappy movie. To define a robot as a legal person with standing in the justice system opened a box worse than anything Pandora could have dreamed about.

  Several thoughts behind Susan, Detective Riviera addressed the point on the table. “I asked him questions he chose not to answer. The right to remain silent is well established.”

  “For people,” Lawrence pointed out. “Do you ask a pedophile’s computer to please disgorge its child pornography and accept its uncommunicativeness as an answer?” Lawrence did not await an answer to his rhetorical question but turned his attention back to Nate. “N8-C, stand up.”

  Nate climbed gingerly to his feet and looked forlornly at his master.

  Lawrence continued. “Tell us what happened to Dr. Ari Goldman.”

  Nate fairly mumbled, “He was killed.”

  “Tell us how, N8-C.”

  Nate remained quietly in place for several moments before replying, “It would appear he was bludgeoned with a Stanley 55-099 FatMax Xtreme FuBar Utility Bar.”

  That startled Susan, not only for the technical jargon spewing from the mouth of someone she ordinarily considered a friend, but because she had believed the tool on the floor was a hammer or, possibly, a wrench.

  Lawrence frowned. “Tell us more details.”

  Nate obliged. “It’s a utility bar used for heavy demolition work, a four-in-one tool for prying, splitting, bending, and—”

  Lawrence interrupted, “Not about the tool, Nate. Tell us more about the murder.”

  Detective Riviera jumped in. “Tell us who killed Dr. Goldman.”

  Nate’s gaze dropped to the floor, and he shuffled from foot to foot, looking for all the world like a chastised child. Then, he gave the last answer Susan expected. “It would appear . . . that I did.”

  It was not exactly a confession, but was apparently near enough one for the detective. He turned to face Lawrence. “Dr. Lawrence Robertson, who designed this robot?”

  “I did,” Lawrence said.

  “And who programmed him?”

  “Myself and my team,” Lawrence said, then added unnecessarily, “I have promised to take full responsibility for anything said or done by N8-C.”

  Susan did not like where this was going, but she felt as helpless to stop it as if it were a speeding locomotive. She closed her eyes, though it seemed absurd and unnecessary. What she really wanted to block out were Detective Riviera’s next words.

  “Dr. Lawrence Robertson, you’re under arrest for the murder of Ari Goldman. You have the right to remain silent. . . .”

  Chapter 4

  Susan Calvin could not leave the police station fast enough, but once out on the street she found herself incapable of reasonable thought or action for the first time in her life. She had kept her cool through medical and personal emergencies, through codes and even gunfire. Now she did not know whether to scream or to cry, to fight or to surrender to the swirl of rage and guilt and fear that encompassed her.

  The police had given Lawrence’s personal effects to Susan, at his request; and she clutched the envelope in a hand oddly steady for the hurricane assault of information and emotion speeding through her brain. She knew their plan: Shut-down Nate, log him into evidence like a cartridge case or a fiber, and charge Lawrence Robertson with the murder. It all seemed so obvious, so pat, so impossible to argue. Yet, Susan knew, none of it made a bit of sense. Ari Goldman and Lawrence were friends and happy colleagues, and positronic robots were incapable of murder as surely as Earth rotated around the sun. Lawrence knew it, too. In fact, he had bet his life on it.

  But truth did not always triumph. Susan could still remember her seventh-grade science teacher saying, “After all, evolution is only a theory.” To the great amusement of her class, Susan had replied, “So’s gravity, but I wouldn’t suggest jumping off a high-rise balcony.” She had gotten her first and only detention for that comment, which had created a firestorm, the end result of which was a new science teacher. Statistically, Susan knew, more people than not believed in ghosts. With all the eyewitnesses dead, Holocaust denial had become widespread, accompanied by growing anti-Semitism. And a statistically significant number of people believed the U.S. government had faked the ongoing Mercury expedition.

  Susan had learned about motivational reasoning, which had become so epidemic, it dwarfed rational analysis by a ratio of eighty to one. Rather than search for information that confirmed or denied a particular belief, the vast majority of people looked only for evidence endorsing what they already believed, particularly when it involved any type of politics. Hypotheses, unbiased studies, and legitimate conclusions had become the realm of scientists only, and even some of those had a tendency to ignore contrary data.

  Susan doubted anyone had undertaken a study to determine how many people suffered from the Frankenstein Complex. She came from a place containing more rational thinkers than most, but she estimated the syndrome at about twenty-five percent. On a twelve-member random jury, likely four would have automatonophobia of sufficient caliber to believe Nate had committed murder even if she could uncover overwhelming evidence to the contrary. His quasi confession in the holding cell would only make the situation worse.

  Susan had faith in her own competence, at least in a medical sense, but the idea of investigating the crime, finding the true killer of Ari Goldman, and presenting her findings to the police seemed daunting beyond consideration. She knew she ought to find herself an experienced private detective with impeccable credentials, but she had no money with which to pay him. Her father had dumped what little savings he had into USR, and it was only just starting to come back to him as pay. Cadmium and the Society for Humanity had taken not only his life, but all of their belongings. Insurance had covered the damages to the apartment and helped her break the lease. She had used the remainder of the money to finance a small apartment near USR, which consisted of a bedroom holding a futon and a tiny chest of drawers, a half bathroom, a living room that allowed for only a love seat and a dorm-sized entertainment system, and a kitchen with miniature appliances.

  To the police, the case was simple, open-and-shut. Proving the innocence of Lawrence Robertson and N8-C, and thus rescuing United States Robots and Mechanical Men, fell to Susan alone. Or did it? Susan considered her other options. The employees of USR had a personal stake in the matter as well. A bunch of nerdy middle-aged scientists had little chance of outmaneuvering the murderer, but they could supply her with useful information. And she knew a detective who had risked the wrath of a Department of Defense Intelligence Agency to assist and protect her in the past.

  Jake Carson. An image of the homicide detective filled Susan’s mind’s eye. In his mid-thirties, he stood a s
olid six feet tall with immaculate, but anachronistic, clothing, a sculpted figure that revealed his familiarity with a gym, and a waist that seemed proportionately too slender. He had short blond hair, quick hazel eyes, and a boxy chin. He, alone, had taken her complaints about the investigation of her father’s murder seriously, and he had gone on to save her life from the SFH and the federal agency in turn.

  Susan knew she needed him, but she had to tread carefully. Like most cops, Jake was intensely loyal to his creed; his life depended on it and so, most times, did the lives of the general public. She needed to convince him of the significance of the situation and her sincerity and devotion to it, and she could never do that by Vox. She glanced at it: 4:05 p.m. She would need to move fast to catch Jake before his shift ended at the Tenth Precinct.

  Susan ran the routes of the glide-buses through her mind. Like most native Manhattanites, she knew them by heart, could grab one that would take her to the appropriate location, if not always by the quickest route. It helped that, until a year ago, she had lived in his precinct. She fast-walked toward the proper station.

  • • •

  The previous time Susan Calvin had visited the Tenth Precinct, she had done so suffused with confusion and rage after being told her bullet-riddled, decapitated father had died of “natural causes.” She had paid little attention to the décor, wanting only to confront Detective Jake Carson, look him straight in the eye, and force him to tell her the truth.

  Again, Susan noticed the similarities between the entry to this precinct and the one she had just left. Both had two-toned walls: the Nineteenth was painted dark blue on the upper half and light blue on the lower, while the Tenth was a deep green on the bottom and light green on the top. Both had waiting areas divided from the rest of the room by a solid half barrier topped by a broad window through which she could see a long desk covered with consoles. Most of the people behind the glass ignored her, a mixture of uniformed officers and clerks of various types, but an enormous dark-skinned woman in institutional blue caught Susan’s eye. “May I help you?”