Talk:Robot
Note on the Terminator[edit]
Please do not add quotes from The Terminator to this page. Once a page is created for cyborg, quotes from The Terminator should go there.
As Kyle Reese correctly points out in the first film, "The Terminator's an infiltration unit: part man, part machine. Underneath, it's a hyper-alloy combat chassis, microprocessor-controlled. Fully armored; very tough. But outside, it's living human tissue: flesh, skin, hair, blood—grown for the cyborgs" (emphases added).
Cheers,
allixpeeke (talk) 19:10, 24 September 2014 (UTC)
This page needs trimming[edit]
I'm not sure that many of the quotes on the page belong - particularly those in the Fictional section. Just because a quote is uttered by a robot does not mean that it belongs on a theme page about robots. I would instead expect quotes about the subject itself. As an example, I consider the following quote from Karel Čapek's R.U.R. to be appropriate for this page.
"Robots do not hold on to life. They can't. They have nothing to hold on with—no soul, no instinct. Grass has more will to live than they do."
But not the following exchange from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back:
C-3PO: [interrupting Han and Leia kissing] Sir. Sir, I've isolated the reverse, power flux coupling.
Han Solo: [annoyed] Thank you. Thank you very much.
C-3PO: [oblivious] Oh, you're perfectly welcome, sir.
I believe that many of the quotes shown here that are not really about the topic of robots should be trimmed. ~ UDScott (talk) 19:24, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
- I thank Allixpeeke (talk · contributions) for recently creating the page, and you for doing some additional work on it. I agree it needs such trimming and formatting work, and accept that it will probably take much time and further effort to develop to most people's satisfaction. I am currently too busy with too many things to attend to it much, but might do a bit on it within the next few weeks, but I expect others will probably get involved more than I shall. ~ ♞☤☮♌Kalki·†·⚓⊙☳☶⚡ 19:47, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
- I agree that the article should contain quotes on the topic of robots, not quotations of robotic characters or quotations about individual robotic characters unless the quotes are about robots as such. Much of this will have to go. (By analogy, the article on Women is for quotes on the topic of women, not quotations of women or quotations about individual women unless the quotes are about women as such.) ~ Ningauble (talk) 11:53, 30 September 2014 (UTC)
- The quotes I included were included because I felt they said something about the nature of robots, not merely because they were uttered by robots.
For example, with the C-3PO quote that UDScott noted above, one will notice that the robot in question seems to lack the capacity to recognise things that most humans easily comprehend, such as sarcasm and annoyance. C-3PO mechanically assumes that he is receiving genuine thanks from Han Solo, since Solo's actual words technically convey thanks, even though we viewers can understand that Han Solo is frustrated because we're taking into account factors (e.g., tone, body language) to which C-3PO is oblivious.
While I do maintain that that exchange does tell us something about the nature of robots, I can understand one thinking that it does not tell us enough about the nature of robots to merit inclusion.
If one thinks that some of these quotes do not successfully convey to the readers qualities we might associate with robots qua robots, let's discuss them. I think what we might find is that relatively little of this might have to go.
For example, in the The Day the Earth Stood Still section, I included two quotes. The first quote is a single line containing four words spoken by a human to a robot in a language understood by the robot but not by the human. It's a very famous line, and I included it because the robot responds to the command by doing a lot of things, despite the command containing so few words, which seemed to indicate to me that the robot was programmed in such a manner as to be able to discern a great deal from very few words. But, I could understand that line being removed from the list since it doesn't really make the subject of robotics all that much clearer. Contrariwise, I would argue strongly that the following quote from Klaatu should remain in the list, since it specifically addresses the primary function of the robots amongst the aliens in the film.
These are the sorts of discussions we may wish to have.
- The quotes I included were included because I felt they said something about the nature of robots, not merely because they were uttered by robots.