i first filed this on #bookwyrm, where it was accepted and thrown away without explanation. which is why i continue to become disenamoured of the platform. but i told @grimalkina i'd share science tidbits from this cat book.
The fear of artificial life is intimately tied up with the word robot itself, which first appeared in the 1921 science fiction play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots), written by the Czech author Karel Čapek. In the play, artificial people—robots—are produced in a factory by the Rossum company. Eventually the robots, who can think for themselves, rise up in rebellion and exterminate almost all of humanity.… The word robot was derived from the Czech roboti, which refers to a serf-like forced laborer.
— Gregory Gbur in Falling Felines and Fundamental Physics https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300231298/falling-felines-and-fundamental-physics/
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