You can buy "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep...Here This is the classic sci-fi novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The Inspiration for the classic Sci Fi film of Blade Runner.
By 2021, the World War has killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remain covet any living creature, and for people who can’t afford one, companies build incredibly realistic simulacra: horses, birds, cats, sheep. They’ve even built humans. Immigrants to Mars receive androids so sophisticated they are indistinguishable from true men or women. Fearful of the havoc these artificial humans can wreak, the government bans them from Earth. Driven into hiding, unauthorized androids live among human beings, undetected. Rick Deckard, an officially sanctioned bounty hunter, is commissioned to find rogue androids and “retire” them. But when cornered, androids fight back—with lethal force.
Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep (DADOES) is a complex and interesting novel. It feels like deep philosophical questions wrapped up in a kafka-esque science fiction version of a near future earth.
The reader is forced to consider what (and who) is real and what (or who) is not. Variously during the reading of this novel, I thought everyone was an android and no-one was an android. The scenes where there is an interrogation of a potential android were tense and to be honest, often I didn't know who I was routing for. The ever so subtle questions to check the person/androids feelings of empathy were benign and terrifying at the same time. I do have a tendency to go off an a mental tangent now and again. I thought how could you apply this in other genres. Interviewing vampires to distinguish them from humans, that could make for an interesting scene. Then I thought interrogating illegal immigrants must be just as terrifying for the interviewees. Anyway I digress back to the book.
The author does an excellent job of recognising future trends. Earth has been ravaged and animal populations all but wiped out. This book is set in 2021 but was written in 1968 way before climate change (although the destruction in the book was due to nuclear war, which in many ways seems closer than ever.) The line between Artificial Intelligence (AI) and humans is so thin as to be non-existent. I think the only thing he missed was that AI could possibly merge with human intelligence rather than be camouflaged into it. Elon Musk is apparently developing chips that could stream an internet type thingee straight into the brain. The author also fore saw a declining religion based on mutual suffering being gradually overpowered by aggressive consumerism led media. As an overall snapshot of the future it was pretty much bang on and our world continues to grow towards the world that the author envisaged.
So the background of the story is fascinating and relevant. It is so good that the actual story has a massive amount to live up to. It starts off well with the chase for the replicants (android humans) and their evil leader Roy Batty. I know he just doesn't sound like a android monster, he sounds like someone from Coronation Street. The ending from a purely storytelling mode is a bit of a disappointment. I feel the author pulls the is real or fake trick just once to often. Readers always want a full stop, a conclusion, a fundamental change. In this regard this is one of those rare times when the film does it better than the book.
All in all a fascinating insight into our shared scary future. It asks one big question without actually asking it directly namely...What does it mean to be human? As a warning it is amazing. As an adventure sci fi it is pretty good too if slightly flawed. If you like a bit of philosophy with your Sci Fi this is the book for you.
“Empathy, evidently, existed only within the human community, whereas intelligence to some degree could be found throughout every phylum and order including the arachnida.”
“Maybe there was once a human who looked like you, and somewhere along the line you killed him and took his place. And your superiors don’t know.”
“An android,” he said, “doesn’t care what happens to another android. That’s one of the indications we look for." “Then,” Miss Luft said, “you must be an android.”
“I never felt this way before. We are machines, stamped out like bottle caps. It's an illusion that I - I personally - really exist; I'm just representative of a type.”
“Empathy, he once had decided, must be limited to herbivores or anyhow omnivores who could depart from a meat diet. Because, ultimately, the emphatic gift blurred the boundaries between hunter and victim, between the successful and the defeated.
- If You Liked This, Then You May Like...
Blind Faith by Ben Elton (Click Here for review) 1984 by George Orwell (Click Here for review) A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Phillip Kindred Dick (December 16, 1928 – March 2, 1982) was an American science fiction and short story writer. Dick explored sociological, political and metaphysical themes in novels dominated by monopolistic corporations, authoritarian governments, and altered states. In his later works, Dick's thematic focus strongly reflected his personal interest in metaphysics and theology.He often drew upon his own life experiences and addressed the nature of drug use, paranoia and schizophrenia, and mystical experiences in novels such as A Scanner Darkly and VALIS. While his interest lay in metaphysical issues, his sympathy always lay with the quiet dignity of the common man facing the difficult challenges of everyday life. (from newworldencyclopedia.org)
Phillip K Dick's writing provided the basis for the films Blade Runner, Total Recall and Minority Report and the TV series The Man In The High Castle.
Phillip Kindred Dick (December 16, 1928 – March 2, 1982) was an American science fiction and short story writer. Dick explored sociological, political and metaphysical themes in novels dominated by monopolistic corporations, authoritarian governments, and altered states. In his later works, Dick's thematic focus strongly reflected his personal interest in metaphysics and theology.
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