Who Gave This Robot a Gun? On Binaries and Personhood in Rossum’s Universal Robots and The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells

Historically, Western robot fiction has been concerned with the humanity of AI and how it impacts its usage as free labor. However, an emerging trend see authors exploring perspectives outside of the human/inhuman binary. By putting the first robot literature (Rossum’s Universal Robots) in conversation with contemporary robot fiction (The Murderbot Diaries) we can ask: What does personhood look like beyond the human? And why is our concept of personhood tied so deeply to labor? What is it about AI that we’re really afraid of?