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"Retire? Yeah, I want to die with my head in the typewriter. That's my idea of retirement."
- Alfred Bester
 |
| Serving Robot | ||
| A non-humanoid robot designed to serve. |
| As they sat down, he aimed his ultraviolet light-pencil at a serving robot. Unlike Mardukan robots, which looked like surrealist conceptions of Pre-Atomic armored knights, it was a smooth ovoid floating a few inches from the floor on its own contragravity; as it approached, its top opened like a bursting beetle shell and hinged trays of food swung out. The boy looked at it in fascination.
"Is that a Sword-World robot, sir, or did you capture it somewhere?" "It's one of our own." He was pardonably proud; it had been built on Tanith a year before. "Has an ultrasonic dishwasher underneath, and it does some cooking on top, at the back." |
| Technovelgy from Space Viking,
by H. Beam Piper. Published by Analog in 1962 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the usuform robots from Anthony Boucher's story Q.U.R..
Thanks to Winchell Chung (aka @nyrath) for the tip.
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from Space Viking
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and Technology by H. Beam Piper
Tech news articles related to Space Viking
Tech news articles related to works by H. Beam Piper
Serving Robot-related
news articles:
- The First 'Drone Cafe' Started By Dutch Students
- Flying Robot Waiters From Infinium Robotics
- 7-Eleven Drone Delivers Chix Sandwich And Slurpee
| Optimus Robot Will Be A Good Nanny, Says Musk |
| LORIS Passive-Gripper Climbing Robot |
| Athena Smart Security Guard Robot With Face Recognition |
| SpaceHopper Microgravity Robot Lands On Its Feet |
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'The pitiless M rays pierced Earth and steel and densest concrete as if they were so much transparent glass...'
'Pina2bo would have to operate full blast for many years to put as much SO2 into the stratosphere as its namesake had done in a few minutes.'
'Nanny is different,' Tom Fields murmured... 'she's not like a machine. She's like a person.'
'We made a crude , small cell and were delighted - and, I admit, somewhat surprised - to find it worked.'
'...we've promised him a generous pension from the royalties.'
'The clothes and jewelery drew their tiny power requirements from her movements.'
'At the end of each appendage's eight fingers there are tinier appendages...'
'We want to do something to help those who are suffering from tooth loss or absence,' said lead researcher Katsu Takahashi.
