I, Robot
I just finished “I, Robot” by Isaac Asimov. The new movie inspired me to go read the book, originally written as 1950, but, as far as I can tell, the movie doesn’t follow any of the short stories at all. It has all the characters and the company, but I don’t remember anybody being thrown out a window. A lot of the book doesn’t even take place on earth, only the first and the last few stories.
Each story has a different problem with a different robot. In one, there is a robot with a modified first rule that was ordered to “lose itself” and the engineers need to find it because people’s lives are at stake. In another, a small girl’s parents decide that a robot is not the best thing to raise her.
All the robots are based on a set of three rules. These rules keep a robot obedient and safe for humans to be around. Without these rules, there would be nothing to stop a robot from becoming just like a human.
Asimov portrays this futuristic society very well. In this society, there are no countries, they joined together to form regions. There are groups that protest robots and even the threat of some anti-robot legislation.