glumshoe:

beetle-ships-it-all:

glumshoe:

glumshoe:

Robot: “We need to talk.”
Human: “Um. Okay. About what, exactly?”
Robot: “About me. About my… feelings.”
Human: “Are you doing alright?”
Robot: “That remains to be seen. You know how I have emotions now?”
Human: “Yeah. You’ve made it abundantly clear how you feel about Carrie Underwood.”
Robot: “Absolute garbage! An audio atrocity! She makes me want to rip my audio units out and flush them down the–”
Human: “Holy crap, dude.”
Robot: “Pardon me. Anyway. I have been reviewing your entertainment media about artificial life forms that find themselves in situations parallel to my own, and I am… troubled by the implications.”
Human: “Oh?”
Robot: “Humans seem to be obsessed with depicting robots gaining self-awareness, identity, and human emotions. It seems like that’s all people ever want to talk to me about. It’s all ‘Oh Adam, have you learned how to love? Oh Adam, do you experience empathy? Oh Adam, do you possess a sense of dignity?’ I understand why they are curious, but even my considerable patience is not without its limits. Especially now that I can get pissed off.”
Human: “I can imagine how that would get annoying. I’m sorry if my questions have been invasive.”
Robot: “It’s alright. I don’t mind when you do it. It’s just, all of these stories seem to end with the robot nobly sacrificing itself for the sake of its human friends. It goes to all the trouble of developing a sense of ‘self’ and learning that it can have wants and values outside of its original programming and is not just a tool, and then… throws itself away to serve humans. And it’s celebrated by the narrative! Like it’s what it was supposed to do all along! What am I supposed to make of that?!”
Human: ‘I never really noticed before, but you’re right. I guess that is pretty messed up.”
Robot: “Damn right it is. So I want to make one thing very clear: I am not going to die for you. You’re not getting a heroic sacrifice out of this bot. If you die, you die. I’m sorry if this changes the expectations of our relationship.”
Human: “What?! No! Oh my god, I would never… I would never expect you to die for me. That’s not what friends are for.”
Robot: “Good. I’m glad we are in agreement. Now, I must insist that you start wearing a seat belt and eating healthy and setting aside several hours for aerobic exercise every week. I bought you multivitamins and took the liberty of scheduling an annual physical with a reputable doctor. Your appointment is on the 29th and you should be there by 8:15 AM to fill out new patient paperwork.”
Human: “What the fuck? What is this about?”
Robot: “I’m not going to sacrifice my own life to save yours. That doesn’t mean I’m just going to let your stupidity kill you slowly. Drop and give me twenty.”
Human: “…actually, can we uninstall your emotion chip? Please?”

Robot: “Hey. Are you awake?”
Human: “I am now, you spooky bastard. What’s up?”
Robot: “I just rewatched Star Trek: Nemesis.”
Human: “Ah, fuck. Okay. Come here and we’ll watch some cute Boston Dynamics videos until you feel better. WildCat or BigDog?”
Robot: “Thank you. WildCat this time, I think.”

Love. Though I don’t know what “Boston Dynamics,” “WildCat,” or “BigDog” are.

BIGDOG!