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"In 1970 I found little difficulty staying 30 years ahead of the man in the street, and now I find it difficult to stay 18 months ahead of the man on the street."
- Vernor Vinge
 |
| Man Kills Servant Robot | ||
| When a robot's master has come to the end of his rope. |
| The robot’s words thudded into Lowndes brain. “An increase is impossible. Master!” he said. He went on, his aud tones crackling, “Indeed, I may have already overstepped in gifting you the five hundred kredits... And Master, if you will forgive my impertinance, I should like to say that I do not believe a marriage with Miss Judy would be prudent.”
In that moment Lowndes’ face turned livid with anger. Seizing the heavy wheel wrench, he lunged for the blue-clad robot. He brought the wrench down squarely in the center of the black bowler.
 ('The Miserly Robot' by R.J. Rice) SSSSSSSSSSS . . . SSSSSSTTTT T . . . CRACKLE . . . SSSSSS TTTT . . . The heavy pronged ironite wrench crashed into Nestor’s cranial tubes, drove through the blue-gray worn pate, sliced into the fragile oldstyle gretile metal, battered and shredded the robot’s upper works into a twisted mass. Again and again, in maniacal fury Lowndes slammed the ironite prongs down. Nestor crashed to the floor in a final hiss and crackle. Lowndes stared at the robot’s smashed remains, stared at bluegray old-fashioned gretile metal scattered in a twisted heap of powdered tubes, shredded relays and curling tensit wires. |
| Technovelgy from The Miserly Robot,
by R.J. Rice. Published by Imagination in 1958 Additional resources -
|
Here is another example of personal violence consisting of a human being shooting a robot:
Henson teetered, tottered, and fell. The whole left side of his face sheared away as he went down...
He was staring down at Henson.
Lita followed his gaze.
Both of them saw it at the same time, then — both of them saw the torn hole in the left side of Henson's head, and the thin strands of wire protruding from the opening.
Compare to mob violence against robots from Autofac (1955) by Philip K. Dick.
...The hand came up with another pocket-iblast aimed and fired all in one motion.
(From 'Comfort Me, My Robot (1955) by Robert Bloch)
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