R.U.R. added its somber view to that of the even more famous Frankenstein, in which the creation of another kind of artificial human being also ended in disaster, though on a more limited scale. Following these examples, it became very common, in the 1920s and 1930s, to picture robots as dangerous devices that invariably destroyed their creators. The moral was pointed out over and over again that “there are some things Man was not meant to know.”
I don’t know if anyone has pointed this out (I’m sure they have) but fundamentally I think it’s related to the cultural impact of the Garden of Eden story. God creates Man in His own image, and Man comes up short and disobeys God. Man creates Robot in his own image, and Robot surpasses man and disobeys him, completing the cultural cycle. Both stories are about human nature being flawed, with robot stories being about how the flawed human nature leads us to want to “become God” by creating life on our own, becoming our own Demiurge, creating a shadow of a shadow of the “Divine Image” which represents goodness and morality.
- Isaac Asimov, The Caves of Steel, introduction
I don’t know if anyone has pointed this out (I’m sure they have) but fundamentally I think it’s related to the cultural impact of the Garden of Eden story. God creates Man in His own image, and Man comes up short and disobeys God. Man creates Robot in his own image, and Robot surpasses man and disobeys him, completing the cultural cycle. Both stories are about human nature being flawed, with robot stories being about how the flawed human nature leads us to want to “become God” by creating life on our own, becoming our own Demiurge, creating a shadow of a shadow of the “Divine Image” which represents goodness and morality.