Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"I don't have an e-mail address. As much as I admire the Internet I suffer literally agoraphobia, which in it's original sense means a fear of the marketplace. I do not want to receive three hundred e-mail messages per week from strangers…"
- William Gibson
 |
| Robot Animals | ||
| Artificial animals created using robotic elements. |
This is the earliest use of the phrase "robot animals" that I know about.
| Gramp strode forward and looked. And what he saw - instead of flesh and bone, instead of any animal structure - were metal plates and molten wire and cogs of many shapes and sizes.
 (Robots from 'Reunion on Ganymede by Clifford D. Simak) "Robots," he said. "I'll be a bowlegged Marshie if that ain't what they are. Nothin' but dog-gone robot animals." |
| Technovelgy from Reunion on Ganymede,
by Clifford Simak. Published by Astounding Science Fiction in 1938 Additional resources -
|
Here's a detailed take on this idea from Otis Adelbert Kline's story The Robot Beasts published in Thrilling Wonder Stories in 1941:
For Dr. Fletcher they represented a lifetime of toil and study. For each and every one of these creatures was not merely a stuffed animal, bird or reptile, but a delicately and intricately constructed robot in which the scientist had attempted to induce a natural degree of the intelligence of its kind by brain transplantation.
The brains, immersed in a nutrient solution which required renewal only once in fifty years, were in crystal brain cases, from which wires, attached to electrodes, ran to various parts of the robot anatomies, acting as motor and sensory nerves.
With muscles and tendons of tough, contractile plastic, and a system of levers, gears, wires and chains of light, strong aluminum alloy; powered by supercharged, lightweight storage batteries in the body cavities, these synthetic creatures were designed not only to see, hear, feel and smell, but to move and react to peripheral stimuli like the original animals.
See also robot dog from an even earlier (1937) Kline short story.
Compare to the electric sheep from Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968) by Philip K. Dick, Purza the Pukha, from The Rowan, a 1990 novel by Anne McCaffrey.
See also Ray Bradbury's mechanical hound from Fahrenheit 451 (1953).
He contemplated these creatures of his wearily, yet with the pride of a creator. There were tiny mice and moles of various colors and types; rats, guinea pigs, rabbits, cats, dogs. There were turtles, frogs, salamanders, lizards and snakes...
Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Reunion on Ganymede
More Ideas
and Technology by Clifford Simak
Tech news articles related to Reunion on Ganymede
Tech news articles related to works by Clifford Simak
| Robots For Hire En Masse |
| Robot Clerks Become A Reality In China |
| Atlas Robot Makes Uncomfortable Movements |
| Humanoid Robots Tickle The Ivories |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
'...each of them is a neural mapping of the mind of a Tibetan monk who actually lived.'
'...there's a narrow belt where the climate is moderate.'
'The leg was to function, in a way, as a servo-mechanism operated by Larry’s brain, through the mediation of the electronic brain in the leg.'
'... every veephone on the continent would display, over and over, two propositions.'
'Completely silent, accurate up to about twenty meters. No recoil...'
'He wore spectacles with thick wavy lenses. The spectacles were intended to make him not only half blind, but to give him whanging headaches besides.'
