I am here to say that I have talked with Campbell, literally and actually—and lived to go back for more. (I don’t want to give the impression that talking with John is easy. But listening is lots of fun too, you know.) But we had lunch together, and both ate spaghetti, and there were no fangs, claws, or horns in evidence.
The following selection is a Campbell editorial from ASF. And now that I think of it, I suppose it is rather ferociously deviant of Mr. Campbell to want to “play robot.”
There are some questions that only small children and very great philosophers are supposed to ask—questions like “What is Death?” and “Where is God?”
And then there are some questions that, apparently, no one is supposed to ask at all; largely, I think, because people have gotten so many wrong answers down through the centuries, that it’s been agreed-by-default not to ask the questions at all.
Science fiction, however, by its very existence, has been asking one question that belongs in the “Let’s agree not to discuss it at all” category—of course, simply by implication, but nevertheless very persistently. To wit: “What do you mean by the term ‘human being’?”
It asks the question in a number of ways; the question of “What is a superman?” requires that we first define the limits of “normal man.” The problem of “What’s a robot?” asks the question in another way.
Some years ago now, Dr. Asimov introduced the Three Laws of Robotics into science fiction:
1. A robot cannot harm, nor allow harm to come to, a human being.
2. A robot must obey the orders of human beings.
3. A robot must, within those limits, protect itself against damage.
The crucial one is, of course, the First Law. The point that science fiction has elided very deftly is… how do you tell a robot what a human being is?
Look … I’ll play robot; you tell me what you mean by “human being.” What is this entity-type that I’m required to leave immune, and defend? How am I, Robot, to distinguish between the following entities: 1. A human idiot. 2. Another robot. 3. A baby. 4. A chimpanzee.
We might, quite legitimately, include a humanoid alien —or even Tregonsee, E. E. Smith’s Rigellian Lensman, and Worsel, the Velantian—which we, as science-fictioneers, have agreed fulfill what we really mean by “human”! But let’s not make the problem that tough just yet.
We do, however, have to consider the brilliant question Dr. W. Ross Ashby raised: If a mechanic with an artificial arm is working on an engine, is the mechanical arm part of the organism struggling with the environment, or part of the environment the organism is struggling with? If I, Robot, am to be instructed properly, we must consider human beings with prosthetic attachments. And, if I am a really functional robot, then that implies a level of technology that could turn up some very fancy prosthetic devices. Henry Kuttner some years back had a story about a man who had, through an accident, been reduced to a brain in a box; the box, however, had plug-in connections whereby it could be coupled to allow the brain in the box to “be” a whole spaceship, or a power-excavator, or any other appropriate machine.
Is this to be regarded as “a robot” or “a human being”? Intuitively we feel that, no matter how many prosthetic devices may be installed as replacements, the human being remains.
The theologians used to have a very handy answer to most of those questions; a human being, unlike animals or machines, has a soul. If that is to be included in the discussion, however, we must also include the associated problems of distinguishing between human beings and incubi, succubi, demons and angels. The problem then takes on certain other aspects … but the problem remains. History indicates that it was just as difficult to distinguish between humans and demons as it is, currently, to distinguish between humans and robots.
Let’s try a little “truth-table” of the order that logicians sometimes use, and that advertisers are becoming fond of. We can try various suggested tests, and check off how the various entities we’re trying to distinguish compare.
You can, of course, continue to extend this, with all the tests you care to think of. I believe you’ll find that you can find no test within the entire scope of permissible-in-our-society-evaluations that will permit a clear distinction between the five entities in the table.
Note, too, that that robot you want to follow the Three Laws is to modify the Second Law—obedience—rather extensively with respect to children and idiots, after you’ve told it how to distinguish between humanoids and chimpanzees.
There have been a good many wars fought over the question “What do you mean… human?” To the Greeks, the peoples of other lands didn’t really speak languages— which meant Greek—but made mumbling noises that sounded like bar-bar-bar, which proved they were barbarians, and not really human.
The law should treat all human beings alike; that’s been held as a concept for a long, long time. The Athenians subscribed to that concept. Of course, barbarians weren’t really human, so the Law didn’t apply to them, and slaves weren’t; in fact only Athenian citizens were.
The easy way to make the law apply equally to all men is to so define “men” that the thing actually works. “Equal Justice for All! (All who are equal, of course.)”
TEST Idiot Robot Baby Chimp Man with prosthetic aids.
Capable of logical thought. No Yes No No Yes
“Do I not bleed?”
(Merchant of Venice test.) Yes No Yes Yes Depends.
Capable of speech? Yes Yes No No Yes
“Rational Animal”;
this must be divided into
A. Rational No Yes No No Yes
B. Animal Yes No Yes Yes Partly
Humanoid form and size Yes Yes No Yes Maybe.
Lack of fur or hair * Yes Yes Yes Maybe partly
A living being Yes No Yes No Depends on what test you use for “living”.
*A visit to a beach in summer will convince you that some adult male humans have a thicker pelt than some gorillas.
This problem of defining what you mean by “human being” appears to be at least as prolific a source of conflict as religion—and may, in fact, be why religion, that being the relationship between Man and God, has been so violent a ferment.
The law never has and never will apply equally to all; there are inferiors and superiors, whether we like it or not, and Justice does not stem from applying the same laws equally to different levels of beings. Before blowing your stack on that one, look again and notice that every human culture has recognized that you could not have the same set of laws for children and adults—not since the saurians lost dominance on the planet has that concept been workable. (Reptilian forms are hatched from the egg with all the wisdom they’re ever going to have; among reptiles of one species, there is only a difference of size and physical strength.)