i,Robot (pg. 68 to pg to 135)

Summary:

The robots have breaken rule number two, as Gregory Powell and Mike Donovan now find themselves in the officer's room being guarded by two robots. Cutie 'pensions' and humiliates Greg and Donovan by claiming that Human's had no longer purpose on Earth. He tells them that they are held dear to the boss for being such servile humans and that the little time that they do have left to live, because they have no purpose, they will be cater for well. They argue back and forth for awhile about the whether or not Earth a purpose to it exist. Powell questions Cutie about the objects in the solar system such as the stars in space. Apparantly the robots' Boss is aiming beams at the Earth as well as other solar objects. Meanwhile, while on their way to Earth, they are also pondering about Dave, the robot miner. Something was going wrong with Dave, he had not produced any ore. They couldn't explain why, and they had no way of telling whether the robot was lying or not, for robots couldn't knowingly lie.
Quote:

"He rocked back and forth in an agony of impotence. Who the heck wants to argue with a robot? It's ... it's—" (Asimov 71).

Reaction:

I chose this quote because Greg and Donovan are trying excessively hard to bypass these robots, and this quote seems to contribute to the hope that they should have. When in fact, all of their contemplations are far-fetched. For instance, Donovan suggests at one point that they should get close to Cutie in order to short-circuit him. The only problem is that this would require the disposition of acid, which Greg points out that Cutie is not crazy enough to let them get close to him with. I also like this quote because, although the word 'mortyfing' is suggested by Donovan after cutting Greg off, Asimov sort of allows the author to choose the word that they think fits into the situation. For instance, I was thinking that the word 'absurd' would fit into the sentence.

i,Robot (Introduction to pg. 67)

Summary:

In the introduction of i,Robot, the narrator starts out by talking to Susan Calvin whom was a Robopsychologist. Dr. Calvin was one of the early creator and supporter of the robots. Dr. Calvin was retiring and was leaving the narrator in charge of Robbie's case, although she never got to know Robbie because he was dismantled the year before she joined the company. Robbie was a robot that could not speak, and was bought and sold in 1996. In the exposition of the story we meet Gloria, a nine-year-old girl, who Robbie serves as a companion to. They start out by playing hide-and-seek and Gloria complains because Robbie did not follow through with his promise to wait for Gloria to find him before he ran. Robbie immediately 'feels' hurt at the feable accusation by Gloria that he 'peeked.' Weston is a neighbor who believes that robots are to be more trusted than nursemaids. We meet Gregory Powell and Mike Donovan when Donovan was upset about no having had Speedy return from the sublevels.
Quote:

"hard-hearted, Robbie paid scant attention to this dreadful possibility, and shook his head a third time" (Asimov 4).

Reaction:

I chose this sentence for several reasons. The first being that is composed in a strong sentence structure. The second being that it contained a moderate level of vocabulary words such as, 'scant' and 'dreadful.' Ultimately, the third, and most interesting thing that I noticed about this sentence was that Gloria noticed results after Robbie's third and final shake of his head. After she threated that she will not tell him any more stories, he gave in and began to frantically nod his head. I found it particularly interesting how this 'thrice' superstitious concept is carried out in yet another work of literature. From Julius Caesar, refusing the crown 3 times, to him being warned about the Ides of March three times, the number 3 symbolizes the beginning or end of something. In this case, Robbie did not shake his head more than 3 times for Gloria to get the ride from him that she wanted.