Significance of Study
Invented the word “robot.” Čapek introduced robots to the world in 1921, when his play “R.U.R.” (subtitled “Rossum’s Universal Robots”) was first performed in Prague. It was performed in New York City the next year, and by the year after that, it had been translated into 30 languages. Translated, that is, except for the word “robot” itself, which originally described artificial humans but within a decade of its introduction came to mean things that were mechanical and electronic in nature.
“R.U.R.” (which stands for “Rossum’s Universal Robots”) premiered in Prague in 1921, Karel Čapek was a well-known Czech intellectual. Like many of his peers, he was appalled by the carnage wrought by the mechanical and chemical weapons that marked World War I as a departure from previous combat. He was also deeply skeptical of the utopian notions of science and technology. “The product of the human brain has escaped the control of human hands,” Čapek told the London Saturday Review following the play’s premiere. “This is the comedy of science.”
Literature Review
In that same interview, Čapek reflected on the origin of one of the play’s characters:
The old inventor, Mr. Rossum (whose name translated into English signifies “Mr. Intellectual” or “Mr. Brain”), is a typical representative of the scientific materialism of the last [nineteenth] century. His desire to create an artificial man — in the chemical and biological, not mechanical sense — is inspired by a foolish and obstinate wish to prove God to be unnecessary and absurd. Young Rossum is the modern scientist, untroubled by metaphysical ideas; scientific experiment is to him the road to industrial production. He is not concerned to prove, but to manufacture.
Thus, “R.U.R.,” which gave birth to the robot, was a critique of mechanization and the ways it can dehumanize people. The word itself derives from the Czech word “robota,” or forced labor, as done by serfs. Its Slavic linguistic root, “rab,” means “slave.” The original word for robots more accurately defines androids, then, in that they were neither metallic nor mechanical.
The character Helena in “R.U.R.” is sympathetic, wanting the robots to have freedom. Radius is the robot that understands his station and chafes at the idiocy of his makers, having acted out his frustrations by smashing statues.
Helena: Poor Radius. … Couldn’t you control yourself? Now they’ll send you to the stamping mill. Won’t you speak? Why did it happen to you? You see, Radius, you are better than the rest. Dr. Gall took such trouble to make you different. Won’t you speak?
Radius: Send me to the stamping mill.
Helena: I am sorry they are going to kill you. Why weren’t you more careful?
Radius: I won’t work for you. Put me into the stamping mill.
Helena: Why do you hate us?
Radius: You are not like the Robots. You are not as skillful as the Robots. The Robots can do everything. You only give orders. You talk more than is necessary.
Helena: That’s foolish Radius. Tell me, has any one upset you? I should so much like you to understand me.
Radius: You do nothing but talk.
Helena: Dr. Gall gave you a larger brain than the rest, larger than ours, the largest in the world. You are not like the other Robots, Radius. You understand me perfectly.
Radius: I don’t want any master. I know everything for myself.
Helena: That’s why I had you put into the library, so that you could read everything, understand everything, and then — Oh, Radius, I wanted to show the whole world that the Robots were our equals. That’s what I wanted of you.
Radius: I don’t want any master. I want to be master over others.
Helena’s compassion saves Radius from the stamping mill, and he later leads the robot revolution that displaces the humans from power. Čapek is none too subtle in portraying the triumph of artificial humans over their creators:
Radius: The power of man has fallen. By gaining possession of the factory we have become masters of everything. The period of mankind has passed away. A new world has arisen. … Mankind is no more. Mankind gave us too little life. We wanted more life.
Humans were doomed in the play even before Radius led the revolt. When mechanization overtakes basic human traits, people lose the ability to reproduce. As robots increase in capability, vitality, and self-awareness, humans become more like their machines — humans and robots, in Čapek’s critique, are essentially one and the same. The measure of worth, industrial productivity, is won by the robots that can do the work of “two and a half men.” Such a contest implicitly critiques the efficiency movement that emerged just before World War I, which ignored many essential human traits.
In the case of Čapek’s play and its offspring, humans pay the price for aspiring to play God. In both works, the flawed relationship between creator and creature drives the plot, and in both cases, the conflict ends in bloodshed.
R.U.R. traces how biomechanical beings become humanized through their development of independent self-consciousness. Robots, created to work for humans, initially behave as automatons, programmed in speech as in action. But the robots deviate from the attitudes and behaviors humans have prescribed for them. A number of factors contribute to these deviations and thus to the eventual rebellion of the robots and the massacre of their human masters. Among these factors are the “křeč robotů” (“robot’s cramp”), the introduction of pain nerves in their manufacture, and experiments to increase their “irritability.” For their development of self-consciousness and for their humanization, however, more crucial moments in the play occur in the robots’ individual and collective confrontations with death. In addition to the “stali jsme se dušemi” (“we have become souls”) scene, where robots respond to the death of humans in a scene of collective conscience, the play also emphasizes three individual confrontations with death. The first is Radius’ refusal to serve humans and his insistence that they can place him in the stamping mill: “Můžete mne poslat do stoupy.” The second is Damon’s sacrifice of himself for the good of the robot group. The last is Primus’ willingness to sacrifice himself for his beloved Helena. I will discuss each of these examples in turn.
Helena is very attractive and all the humans on the island (there are not many) are drawn to her. She ends up marrying the head manager, and ten years pass. During that interval, one of the engineers, prodded by Helena, has begun making robots that are more “human” in some unspecified way. These humanized robots resent the humans who dominate them, and they lead a revolt. Eventually all humans worldwide are exterminated, except for one engineer, Alquist, who is given the task of discovering how to produce more robots, since they have a 20-year life span. But Helena, before her own death, has burned old Rossum’s recipe. Alquist fails at his task, so most of the robots are doomed to suffer the same fate as the humans, but two of the modified robots, Primus and Helena, fall in love at the very end, suggesting that one day the Earth might see the rise of a new kind of civilization. The play is dated in many ways but surprisingly fresh in others. The idea that even “soulless” robots might resent human mistreatment and rebel against their oppressors is at the heart of the film I, Robot (2004) (but not the Isaac Asimov book of that title), and the notion that robots would (and should) have a limited lifespan is a central element in Blade Runner (1982). Certainly the idea that humans find purpose and meaning in work and might cease to reproduce if all work is done by robots (as happens in the play) is thought provoking even today.Čapek’s robots were autonomous beings, but biological, not mechanical, made of chemically synthesized soft matter resembling living tissue, like the synthetic humans in Blade Runner, Westworld, or Ex Machina. The contributors to the collection—scientists and other scholars—explore the legacy of the play and its connections to the current state of research in artificial life, or A Life. Throughout the book, it is impossible to ignore Čapek’s prescience, as his century-old science fiction play raises contemporary questions with respect to robotics, synthetic biology, technology, artificial life, and artificial intelligence, anticipating many of the formidable challenges we face today.
Act I
Helena, the daughter of the president of a major industrial power, arrives at the island factory of Rossum’s Universal Robots. She meets Domin, the General Manager of R.U.R., who tells her the history of the company:
In 1920 a man named Rossum came to the island to study marine biology, and in 1932 he accidentally discovered a chemical that behaved exactly like protoplasm, except that it did not mind being knocked around. Rossum attempted to make a dog and a man, but failed. His nephew came to see him, and the two argued nonstop, largely because Old Rossum only wanted to create animals to prove that not only was God not necessary but that there was no God at all, and Young Rossum only wanted to make himself rich. Eventually, Young Rossum locked his uncle in a laboratory to play with his monsters and mutants, while Young Rossum built factories and cranked out Replicants by the thousands. By the time the play takes place, Replicants are cheap and available all over the world. They have become absolutely necessary because they allow products to be made at a fifth the previous cost.
Helena meets Fabry, Dr. Gall, Alquist, Busman, and Hallemeier, and reveals she is a representative of the League of Humanity, a human rights organization that wishes to “free” the Replicants. The managers of the factory find this a ridiculous proposition, since they see Replicants as appliances. Helena requests that the Replicants be paid so that they can buy things they like, but the Replicants do not like anything. Helena is eventually convinced that the League Of Humanity is a waste of money. Domin and Helena fall in love and are engaged to be married.
Act II
Ten years later, Helena and her nurse Nana are talking about current events—particularly the decline in human births. Helena and Domin reminisce about the day they met and summarize the last ten years of world history, which has been shaped by the new worldwide Replicant-based economy. Helena meets Dr. Gall’s new Replicant experiment, Radius, and Dr Gall describes his experimental female Replicant, Replicant Helena. Both are more advanced, fully featured versions. In secret, Helena burns the formula required to create Replicants. The revolt of the Replicants reaches Rossum’s island as the act ends.
Act III
The characters sense that the very universality of the Replicants presents a danger. Reminiscent of the Tower of Babel, the characters discuss whether creating national Replicants who were unable to communicate beyond their language group would have been a good idea. As Replicant forces lay siege to the factory, Helena reveals she has burned the formula. The characters lament the end of humanity and defend their actions, despite the fact that their imminent deaths are a direct result of those actions. Busman is killed attempting to negotiate a peace with the Replicants, who then storm the factory and kill all the humans except for Alquist, whom the Replicants spare because they recognize that “he works with his hands like the(m).”
Epilogue
Years have passed and all humans had been killed by the replicant revolution except for Alquist. He has been working to recreate the formula that Helena destroyed. Because he is not a scientist, he has not made any progress. He has begged the replicant government to search for surviving humans, and they have done so. There are none. Officials from the government approach Alquist and first order and then beg him to complete the formula, even if it means he will have to kill and dissect other Replicants to do so. Alquist yields, agreeing to kill and dissect, which completes the circle of violence begun in Act Two. Alquist is disgusted by it. Replicants Primus and Helena develop human feelings and fall in love. Playing a hunch, Alquist threatens to dissect Primus and then Helena; each begs him to take him- or herself and spare the other. Alquist realizes that they are the new Adam and Eve, and gives charge of the world to them.