So I'm reading Asimov's short-story anthology The Complete Robot, which contains stories written between 1939 and 1977, and I'm fascinated by several instances in which Asimov tries to predict the future of robotics.

When he gets it right is just as interesting as when he gets it wrong, as even when he's wrong, he's wrong in very interesting ways.

For example, it's very interesting how Asimov seems to think that everything must have a positronic brain (which often produces something either identical or very close consciousness), when in reality we now have numerous useful robots that have nothing of the sort.

So this made me thinking, I think I'd like to write a story that was just like that, an exploration of universal themes that is facilitated by simplified technology. A form of retrofuturism. And since I had the idea, obviously someone else had it before. I wanna read it! More recent stories, especially those with old-school robots and artificial intelligence. Any suggestions?

Also open to other medias, but books would be particularly helpful.

After watching this and this, and dealing with the cringe and shock, I wondered about whether these things, including this but also stuff like sex robots or other robots whose purpose is some sort of affection, will ever take off. I know the phenomenon where in Japan adult males date handheld gameboy-like computers (wut?), but apart from that, I'm not sure anybody will prefer these stuff instead of the real thing. It also feels deeply weird, bizarre and cringy. What do you think of these tech?

Earlier I saw a post on imgur about how the mars rover has now been carrying out it's mission for almost 15 years, but recently a large dust storm has resulted in NASA being unable to contact the robot at all. Whilst reading the post I felt a sudden sadness for this poor little robot that has been on its own for such a long time and now it can't even communicate with home. I caught myself and wondered why I was feeling such sadness for a electronic device on the other side of solar system.

One possible explanation I had was that most humans all share a common disliking of the feeling of loneliness, and feel sad for those experiencing that feeling, regardless of whether that thing is human or not. Maybe it's just me, but I feel like a lot of other people also hate to see others in a position of loneliness as I think at some point in everyones life you experience some form of loneliness and therefore know how horrible it is to be in that situation. There's a really good quote by Carl Sagan that sums this up rather nicely: “In all our searching, the only thing we've found that makes the emptiness bearable is each other.”

Do any of you fellow users occasionally feel bad for robots or have done so in the past, and why? I'm sure I can't be the only one but I'd like to hear other peoples take on the subject.