"This is George, gentlemen," he said. "Late of Zanthar, he tells me."
The officers stared.
"He's not giving you any—er—trouble, is he, Professor?"
"No," Prof. Tomlin said. "We've been having a discussion."
The officers eyed the humanoid with suspicion, and then, with obvious reluctance, went back to their car.
"Yes, I am a machine," George resumed. "The finest, most complicated machine ever made. I have a rather unique history, too. Ages ago, humans on Zanthar made the first robots. Crude affairs—we class them as First Order robots; the simple things are still used to some extent for menial tasks.
"Improvements were made. Robots were designed for many specialized tasks, but still these Second and Third Order machines did not satisfy. Finally a Fourth Order humanoid was evolved that performed every function demanded of it with great perfection. But it did not feel emotion. It did not know anger, love, nor was it able to handle any problem in which these played an important part.
"Built into the first Fourth Order robots were circuits which prohibited harming a human being—a rather ridiculous thing in view of the fact that sometimes such a thing might, from a logical viewpoint, be necessary for the preservation of the race or even an individual. It was, roughly, a shunt which came into use when logic demanded action that might be harmful to a human being."
"You are a Fourth Order robot, then?" the professor asked.