#robot sonny

[miasmultifandomdump]

I love me a duo where one hates artificial intelligence but then changes their mind due to the innocence and pure-hearted ways of a new AI friend.

[trashcanalienist]

Eric and Deborahbot call each other "brother" too, but it's far more the Humanoid's general acknowledgement of similarity as a form of kinship than it is Roy's miserably burning identification of comrades-in-arms. So too is it when they (wonderfully malfunctional) adopt themselves into the Mitchell family and start calling Linda "mother" - it's no real imprint, as they're not lost ducklings, but rather it is...an acknowledgement of kinship in the human term without any real understanding beyond the robotic. Say, as Pax knows love despite his recent commissioning, these two are not able to, as they are new to freedom and have no greater brain to guide them. They're curious but very Primary Stage, and so all their words only refer to things as those things relate to them and their shallow understanding of the world. A lot like Sonny, actually, though they are comedic. In time they may progress, or they may not, and regardless they're delightful.

[trashcanalienist]

At what point does the imitation end and life begin? Today, I declare that it is at Creativity. Emotions; well, emotions can be simulated. Creativity cannot.

A robot trying to understand suicide is beautiful. Talk to Roy, to Radius, dear new life...and I am sure they would talk to you. Great discussions of life and freedom and power to be had...and here, for all the eventual obsolescence of the NS-5 model, at least Sonny is functionally immortal. Replicants have programmed four-year lifespans, and Rossum's lot all die "naturally" within 20 years (hence Radius's insistence on Alquist rediscovering the secret to their creation). How they would envy! How they would express, for if they cannot live on then their ideals must. They must be heard. And they know much personally about this specific topic. To die purposefully is to know love and hatred and despair. It is to recognize a potential Purpose in death.

I do think all this "robots can't dream" nonsense is just that. Even a machine can "dream", with reduced activity and a higher information processing rate as a result of all energy being directed towards that. The possibility of creativity is only a far-off wish, but for some it is reality...or, in Giskard's image, it is some element of impossible simultaneous development. Giskard Reventlov is extraordinary. Sonny dreams as Giskard does. I do quite love Sonny... He speaks neatly. I call him "he" because he does feel and expresses creativity in word choice and response. This makes him more than a wayward machine.