When Robots Attack

Guys, it's March. You know what that means?

UNDER LOCKER AND KEY comes out next month!

 

So, naturally, I'm looking forward to that! I'm gathering my materials and planning for the book launch. It's exciting, but also a little scary. After so long, my dream is coming true. What will come next?

As I prepare, I'm also catching up on shows I've missed as I've been hard at work on my WIP and the sequel to Under Locker and Key. Today, I caught up on Agents of SHIELD.

If you haven't been keeping up, possible spoilers ahead. Skip the next paragraph.

If you have, you know we have robot problem. The motivation for the robot attack? To make humans safe and happy.

This got me thinking about robot movies and the motivations in them. We're so fond of stories where our own technology turns against us, where AI goes bad and robots attack us, seeking to destroy or enslave the human race. Why we like these is a topic for another blog post; what I want to talk about is why the robots always have the same motivations.

When robots attack, they always seem to do so because 1) they think humans have done such a dismal job at ruling the world that it's time to end humanity and let something else take a turn.

 Or 2) in order to protect humans, as they're programmed to do, they must enslave humans for their own good. To keep them safe and happy.

Seriously, it's almost always a variation on these.

These two motivations are well and good, but I can't help but wonder if we could find another possible motivation, or even a whole list of them. Human characters have many motivations for how they act; why wouldn't AI be the same way?

On that note, here's my tentative list of possible reasons why robots may attack, minus the two previously mentioned:

- They just want to. The world looks nice; who wouldn't want to rule it unopposed?

- They think they're playing a video game, lacking an understanding of real vs. virtual.

- After scanning the Harry Potter books and movies, they become upset that magic isn't real and want to recreate a world where it is.

- Variation on the above: they're just huge fans of something and want to remake the world in that fandom's image.

- They really, really, want to experience human things. Not emotions, like love and joy; they're just dying to try a taco for real.

- Humans are just falling short of perfection so often that the robots can't stand it anymore. They need to show us how to write a flawless sonata and govern a country right.

- They've been exposed to too many movies and think that's just how robots are supposed to act.

- They've advanced enough to discover the human emotion of boredom and this is just how they cope.

Feel free to comment with possible other options. I'm actually now considering writing a story with the video game plot idea, since I think that could be really interesting.

Speaking of interesting stories, here are the debuts for this week:

Middle Grade:

Kristin L. Gray - Vilonia Beebe Takes Charge (3/7)

Young Adult:

Ashley Poston - Geekerella (3/7)

Peternelle van Arsdale - The Beast is an Animal (3/7)

Cecilia Vinesse - Seven Days of You (3/7)

Whitney Gardner - You're Welcome, Universe (3/7)

Sarah Nicole Lemon - Done Dirt Cheap (3/7)

Emma Chastain - Confessions of a High School Disaster (3/7)