I, Robot

The Three Laws of Robotics are a set of rules devised by roboticist Isaac Asimov, to govern how a robot may interact with people and other machines. They posit that 1) a robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm; 2) a robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law; and 3) a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. The laws were introduced in Asimov's 1942 short story "Runaround," although foreshadowed two years earlier in his second story about robots, "Reason. "