Gregory Powell Character Analysis

It was Powell who broke the desperate silence. “In the first place,” he said, “Speedy isn’t drunk—not in the human sense—because he’s a robot, and robots don’t get drunk. However, there’s something wrong with him which is the robotic equivalent of drunkenness.”

“To me, he’s drunk,” stated Donovan, emphatically, “and all I know is that he thinks we’re playing games. And we’re not. It’s a matter of life and very gruesome death.”

He called a last time, desperately: “Speedy! I’m dying, damn you! Where are you? Speedy, I need you.”

He was still stumbling backward in a blind effort to get away from the giant robot he didn’t want, when he felt steel fingers on his arms, and a worried, apologetic voice of metallic timbre in his ears.

“These are facts which, with the self-evident proposition that no being can create another being superior to itself, smashes your silly hypothesis to nothing.”

“Obedience is the Second Law. No harm to humans is the first. How can he keep humans from harm, whether he knows it or not? Why, by keeping the energy beam stable. He knows he can keep it more stable than we can, since he insists he’s the superior being, so he must keep us out of the control room. It’s inevitable if you consider the Laws of Robotics.”

Donovan pounded the desk, “But, Greg, he only goes wrong when we’re not around. There’s something—sinister—about— that.” He punctuated the sentence with slams of fist against desk.

“Remember, those subsidiaries were Dave’s ‘fingers.’ We were always saying that, you know. Well, it’s my idea that in all these interludes, whenever Dave became a psychiatric case, he went off into a moronic maze, spending his time twiddling his fingers.”

She went on, “So he accepted the item, but not without a certain jar. Even with death temporary and its importance depressed, it was enough to unbalance him very gently.”

She brought it out calmly, “He developed a sense of humor—it’s an escape, you see, a method of partial escape from reality. He became a practical joker.”

It was Powell who broke the desperate silence. “In the first place,” he said, “Speedy isn’t drunk—not in the human sense—because he’s a robot, and robots don’t get drunk. However, there’s something wrong with him which is the robotic equivalent of drunkenness.”

“To me, he’s drunk,” stated Donovan, emphatically, “and all I know is that he thinks we’re playing games. And we’re not. It’s a matter of life and very gruesome death.”

He called a last time, desperately: “Speedy! I’m dying, damn you! Where are you? Speedy, I need you.”

He was still stumbling backward in a blind effort to get away from the giant robot he didn’t want, when he felt steel fingers on his arms, and a worried, apologetic voice of metallic timbre in his ears.

“These are facts which, with the self-evident proposition that no being can create another being superior to itself, smashes your silly hypothesis to nothing.”

“Obedience is the Second Law. No harm to humans is the first. How can he keep humans from harm, whether he knows it or not? Why, by keeping the energy beam stable. He knows he can keep it more stable than we can, since he insists he’s the superior being, so he must keep us out of the control room. It’s inevitable if you consider the Laws of Robotics.”

Donovan pounded the desk, “But, Greg, he only goes wrong when we’re not around. There’s something—sinister—about— that.” He punctuated the sentence with slams of fist against desk.

“Remember, those subsidiaries were Dave’s ‘fingers.’ We were always saying that, you know. Well, it’s my idea that in all these interludes, whenever Dave became a psychiatric case, he went off into a moronic maze, spending his time twiddling his fingers.”

She went on, “So he accepted the item, but not without a certain jar. Even with death temporary and its importance depressed, it was enough to unbalance him very gently.”

She brought it out calmly, “He developed a sense of humor—it’s an escape, you see, a method of partial escape from reality. He became a practical joker.”