The humanoids
From back cover of Avon Books paperback April 1980: STRANGE BENEFACTORS From far beyond Earth came a generation of benevolent robots whose sole purpose was to serve man by ending wars and easing his bodily and spiritual ills. Dr. Clay Forester, brilliant scientist and citizen of the distant future, had been recruited by a band of dissidents to stop the fledgling "brave new world." But why should he try to kill humanity's only hope for everlasting peace? A vagabond band of psychic anarchists are determined to defeat the invincible robots. And Clay Forester must discover the secret of the Humanoids and make an agonizing choice: fight for mankind's freedom to struggle and despair... or yield to the Humanoids' implacable imperative of total peace and pure bliss.
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What Hacker News says
- With Folded Hands (novella)
The Humanoids
by Jack Williamson ( ~ 1949 )
Simple premise: Slowly the humanoids spread throughout the galaxy, threatening to stifle all human endeavor.
ie. Humanity gets hugged to death by AI via robots that helicopter cuddle smother them for their own good.
- This is the plot of The Humanoids, by Jack Williamson (1947): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/With_Folded_Hands
This is an excellent example of the prescience of thoughtful science fiction. If Asimov popularized robotics and the famous three laws, Williamson should be recognized and given credit for examining (or warning about?) the implications of AI seventy years ago!
- Asimov's peers during the formative years/decades of science fiction (the 'Golden Age' of SF) are all worth reading: A E Van Vogt, Robert Heinlein, James Schmitz, Murray Leinster, Jack Williamson, and many more. Arthur C Clarke - of similar gargantuan SF stature - was Asimov's pal; their friendly barbs at each other are hilarious.
Each writer has a unique style and outlook, and they're all worth reading. You'll find many unforgettable stories (such as 'The Humanoids', by Jack Williamson). Indeed, writers like James Schmitz were so far ahead of their time that they're still awaiting re-discovery.
- > That website has the worst design imaginable.
Firefox reader mode fixes that, and that site really needs it.
Reviewers of the Culture novels tend to project their own political biases onto it. This writer quotes Marx a bit too much. There's some other review where someone was trying to read race and gender issues onto the Culture. They're missing the point.
The Culture novels describe a stable society where the machines are in charge. That's been addressed many times in science fiction, but not, usually, well. Asimov's later robot novels, where it become clear that the robots are manipulating humanity, do address it. That's about as good as it gets. Frank Herbert's Dune has the "Butlerian Jihad", but Herbert's idea of robot social organization is just humans in robot costume. Jack Williamson's "Humanoids" stories, about benign but overprotective robots, reflect someone getting the goal system slightly wrong.
In more popular culture, The Forbin Project (1970), a movie which seems to be enjoying a renaissance, does address the issue. The machines which control the nuclear weapons of both sides get into contact, and agree to take over to keep humanity from destroying itself. They come up with a reasonably sensible plan for running things, which is fleshed out more in the books.
The Star [Trek|Wars|Gate] universe never really addresses this directly, since it would undermine the show's stars. Nor does the Marvel universe; AIs appear, but are not in charge. There's Marshall Brain's "Manna", of course, the dystopian version of this.
The Culture novels show a stable society that's run by intelligent machines yet is flexible, adaptable, can deal with crises, and is pleasant for humans to live in. They don't show how to get there. Which is a problem.
- Jack Williamson attempted a kind of exposition of these issues in The Humanoids (1948), the follow up to his classic story With Folded Hands (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/With_Folded_Hands).
What's interesting about the book is his attempt to validate a human existence in which it is not necessary for humans to do anything practical whatsoever...unless they wish to.
Personally I think we are hundreds of years away from needing to start to worry about this problem. We're more likely to get destroyed some other way first.
Fun times.
