Bring on the 'bots!

I was in the library going through sthe do-it-yourself books when I ran across this book that tells me that intelligent robots can be built. Wow. How far away are we from a Utopia where robots are doing our jobs for us? It's too late for me, I think, but maybe sometime in the future everyone will have a Robby the Robot to send off to earn a living while they go on vacation or sit home and watch TV.

If I had a robot I'd like to program it to shoot death rays or at least to beat the crap out of all my enemies.Click on pictures for full-size images.

When I was a kid there were movies, comics, television programs and movies that featured robots. They all had humanlike characteristics. What a bore when I grew up and saw things they called "robots" welding pieces on cars. It was a comedown to dull reality. Now I see these books on robots showing humanoid robots on their covers. Yippee. Maybe my old childhood robot fantasies aren't just fantasies after all.

These are a couple of books with the images of robots I grew up with:
The scientist and writer Isaac Asimov wrote science fiction stories about robots. He came up with three laws of robotics. Maybe some day we'll need these!

1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Ciao for now.