3 Laws Of Robotics

David probably does have similar programming but here's the catch : the three laws of robotics are sufficiently ambiguous that a high level AI like David can pretty much do what he wants and still be operating within the framework of the three laws. There are some interesting articles about the ambiguities in the three laws.

Doesn't Bishop reference the Three Laws in Aliens as part of his "behavioral inhibitor"? Maybe they're a later innovation in this universe.

Maybe I missed it, but I saw no reference to the three laws, but it did seem to me that david8 had priority to Weyland's commands anyway. It seemed to me that almost all of the morally questionable things David8 made, came out of orders from Weyland. You could, though, see some sort of personal motivation by how he was treated when he infected Holloway. BTW, I think the engineer/jockey or whatever you want to call it, was pissed off because of what David8 told him, that did not correspond to what Shaw was telling him. It could also be the case that David8 did not really understand the language and miscomunicated with the giant blue man; verbal language is notoriously tricky to convey meaning...

If you watch Aliens you will see that Asimov's three laws are not applied to Robots in this fictional universe until after The Android Ash malfunctions in Alien - this is explained by Bishop. Including Asimovs three laws in Prometheus would have been a huge continuity flaw

You mean these... 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 the orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. 3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws. Well I know Bishop states the first one in Aliens, and for the most part, in line with the fact that he was obviously programmed to follow orders from W-Y, he adhered to all three. But, these 3 "laws" were devised by a sci-fi writer, and as such aren't actual laws, and are even dependent on the robots function... For example, a Terminator is not bound by any of these laws, even its ancestor the T-1, which is just a fictional, land based variation of Predator Drones would have no need for such laws.

In Alien, when Ash says he admires the Xenonmorph's purity because he is "Unclouded by conscience, remorse or delusions of morality" he seems to be admitting he feels remorse for leading the human crew to their doom. He envies the creature's freedom to kill without regrets. That could be an indicator that the "three laws" exist on him, but he can be programed to ignore or violate them.

Everyone refers to David as an android but he appears to be more human than that and even hides his emotions (he only smiles when no one is looking; the movie opens with him eating and drinking; he watches a movie then dies his hair to match one of the actors; etc.). So I think David is a Replicant. In Ridley Scott's other masterpiece, Blade Runner, Eldon Tyrell tells Deckard "More human than human; that's our moto at the Tyrell Corporation". As much as I love stories from Asimov's Robot Series (including the three laws), a creation more human than human might be very devious.

Asimov's robots developed the [url=http://asimov.wikia.com/wiki/Zeroth_Law_of_Robotics]Zeroth Law[/url] which supersedes it... and did all sorts of chaotic things... Asimov wound up more or less letting them do a 'good job' at watching over humanity but really... not much to compare it to.

This has been discussed before and the best way to summarise was this I thought: Asimov's three laws are born from sci-fiction. Prometheus is born from sci-fiction in a completely separately conceived universe. Neither has to follow each other or derive any such relevance to one another if it doesn't want to. The story as such didn't necessitate it. That, or Lindelof - as i'm guessing a good chunk of this generation's viewing audience - had no idea they existed and were oblivious to them them

AFAIK, Asimov was the only hard sci-fi write who avoided the Frankenstein Complex and he did it with the 3 (or sometimes 4) laws. But if David (and Meredeth Vickers?) are Replicants, they will be more like humans than Daneel and Giskard in Asimov's Robot Series. [url=http://www3.sympatico.ca/n.rieck/Asimov-suggested-reading-order.html]Asimov 15-Book Suggested Reading Order[/url]