I, Robot - Chapter 6: Little Lost Robot

October 8th 2009

This chapter got off to a slow start. It was full of "hyper space" talk, that really threw me in to a couple of brain freezes. The chapter is on Hyper Base, in space, an asteriod base where scientists are working to develope a hyper space drive. 63 robots with Law #1 (Robots must never harm a human being) modified have been transported to the Hyper Base, in order to complete special operations. One of the robots was annoying one of the workers apparently, and the worker told him to go "lose yourself". The robot did just that, and hid among the other robots of the space stations.

These robots happen to not have serial number, and are expected to apply to their work. With this incident, Susan Calvin, and co-workers are asked to come to hyper base to locate this lost robot.

I am starting to notice a pattern in these chapters. I have noticed that most of these plots involve robot failures and errors, but I guess what these events are that Susan Calvin is describing are key events in the US Robotics history. I feel it is an understandable structure in the book, but it seems to be getting just a little bit repetitive.

Susan must put the robots threw a series of operations in order to determine what robot is Nester 10, the lost robot. In the end, Susan finds the robot, after a long very boring chapter.

At this point, the novel looses a bit of my taste. A lot of these stories are hard to follow, but it really does amaze me how much detail is thrown into a novel like this written in the 40s!
Again, the chapter was a little long and boring in my opinion, but it did include a very clever plot by Isaac.