Joseph the Golem—The Limits of Synthetic Humanity

Pedersen, Ellen M. "Joseph the Golem—The Limits of Synthetic Humanity." Foundation #40 (Summer 1987): 36-44.

Primarily on the Golem of Rabbi Judah Loew of Prague, celebrated in a legend showing "the most clear-headed human-machine thinking produced after the Three Laws of Robotics—or rather, long before" (39). Golem stories are not quite as important for the history of robots and androids as sometimes thought, but their making problematic the relationship between humans and our machines makes them a central matter for the study of SF (42). See in this Category, R. Plank on "The Golem and the Robot."