Gods and robots : myths, machines, and ancient dreams of technology / Adrienne Mayor.

"The first robot to walk the earth was a bronze giant called Talos. This wondrous machine was created not by MIT Robotics Lab, but by Hephaestus, the Greek god of invention. More than 2,500 years ago, long before medieval automata, and centuries before technology made self-moving devices possible, G...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Mayor, Adrienne, 1946- (Author)
Language:English
Published: Princeton, New Jersey : Princeton University Press, [2018]
Subjects:
Robotics > History.
Robots > Mythology.
Science, Ancient.
Science and civilization.
Technology > Religious aspects.
Inventions > History.
Technology and civilization.
Artificial intelligence > History.
Artificial intelligence > Social aspects.
Technology > Rome > History.
Technology > History.
Technology > Greece > History.
Technology.
Inventions.
Artificial intelligence.
Robotics.
Rome (Empire)
Greece.
History.
Genre:
History.
Physical Description:xvi, 275 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some color) ; 25 cm
Variant Title:
Myths, machines, and ancient dreams of technology
Format: Book
Contents:
  • Introduction: made, not born
  • The robot and the witch: Talos and Medea
  • Medea's cauldron of rejuvenation
  • The quest for immortality and eternal youth
  • Beyond nature: enhanced powers borrowed from gods and animals
  • Daedalus and the living statues
  • Pygmalion's living doll and Prometheus's first humans
  • Hephaestus: divine devices and automata
  • Pandora: beautiful, artificial, evil
  • Between myth and history: real automata and lifelike artifices in the ancient world
  • Epilogue. Awe, dread, hope: deep learning and ancient stories.