Dear Riley,
I found this book after reading some articles on artificial intelligence. It sat in my wish list for a while, and I later learned the 1980’s movie Bladerunner was based off this novel. I never watched Bladerunner, and it wasn’t until the movie was referenced in Ready Player One that I decided to pick it up. Apparently it’s a sci-fi classic. So that’s the roundabout way this title ended up on my Kindle. I read the book thinking it was written in the 80’s, the same decade as Bladerunner. It wasn’t until I finished, that I found out it was actually written in 1968! Now it made sense why it was so popular. A sci-fi novel about a bounty hunter chasing down AI androids in 2021 would be pretty awesome and creative back in 1968.
The story takes place on Earth in a dystopian 2021, where nuclear war has killed millions, and brought animals to near extinction. Most of the planet has left to colonize Mars, and the remaining humans are split between those trying to care for the few animals left, and those that have been retarded by radioactive fallout.
Rick Deckard is a bounty hunter. His job is to hunt down androids that have killed their masters on Mars, and fled to find a new life on Earth. Rick can’t afford a real animal, so he takes care of an electric sheep. Empathy is a big thing in this new society, and caring for an animal (even electric), allows people to express that empathy. Rick dreams of one day being able to afford a real animal, maybe something exotic like an ostrich. He gets his big break one morning as he’s handed a pay day case. Six dangerous androids are on the loose, one of which has seriously injured the previous bounty hunter on the job. Now Rick must step in and “retire” them before the androids flee.
The androids are indistinguishable from real humans. The only way to detect one is to submit them to the Voight Kampff empathy test. The Voight Kampff is a machine which detects small changes in a person’s vitals as they are asked a series of questions. It’s used to measure the subjects empathetic response.
Rick sets out on his hunt, and the situation gets more complex and challenging with each android he comes across. There are a few mind blowing moments, where the author challenges you to question what is really happening via a set of paradigm shifts and plot twists. It also raises the topic of consciousness, and what it really means to be alive. All pretty crazy stuff for 1968. I haven’t watched Bladerunner yet, but I can see how this story would be a nerdy cult classic.
It’s one of the classic sci-fi novels, and at only 250 pages, a pretty quick read. The new movie “Bladerunner 2049” comes out this year. I definitely want to check it out. But I’ll be sure to watch the original Bladerunner first!
Love,
Dad
7/8/2017
It’s 7am, and I’ve got the baby monitor next to me. You are wriggling around in your crib. You used to wake up screaming and crying every morning. Now you kind of just lay there and say “mamma, baba”. Now I’m actually having a conversation with you throughout he 2-way radio. Haha.