Everything about R Daneel Olivaw totally explained
R. Daneel Olivaw is a fictional
robot created by
Isaac Asimov. The "R" initial in his name stands for "robot," a naming convention in Asimov's future society. Olivaw appears in Asimov's
Robot/
Foundation Series, most notably in the novels
The Caves of Steel,
The Naked Sun,
The Robots of Dawn,
Robots and Empire,
Prelude to Foundation,
Forward the Foundation,
Foundation and Earth. Since he also appears in all of the books of the
Second Foundation Trilogy, Daneel is the most commonly appearing Asimov character.
Character biography
Olivaw is a Robot built by Roj Nemennuh Sarton and
Han Fastolfe, who are
Spacer roboticists from the planet
Aurora, in the year 4920 AD
(External Link
). Unlike many robots of the period, Olivaw is constructed to be virtually indistinguishable from a human being (an
android) and was the first of the humanoid robots. This "undercover" attribute enables him to help earth-policeman
Elijah Baley solve crimes. Olivaw and Baley first meet while Baley is investigating the murder of his co-creator Sarton in
Spacetown.
Olivaw has a broad, high-cheekboned face and short bronze hair lying flatly backward and without a part. He wore clothes and, in
The Caves of Steel, can't be told apart from a human unless he's seen in a situation where he refuses to violate the
Three Laws of Robotics. In this novel, Daneel was also capable of conducting
cerebroanalysis on humans as he met them. Cerebroanalysis is the fictional
interpretation of the electromagnetic fields of the living brain cells.
Olivaw and Baley work together on a murder case on Spacer planet
Aurora, as well as on the case of the "roboticide" of Olivaw's "brother,"
Jander Panell. Also on Aurora, he first meets
R. Giskard Reventlov, a robot with unique
telepathic and
mind control powers. In an interesting evolution of robotic sociology, Olivaw comes to see the need for a new law to be added to Asimov's now familiar "
Three Laws of Robotics": the "Zeroth Law of Robotics" ("A robot may not injure humanity, or, through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm") after both robots come to see the incompleteness of the existing Laws. The Zeroth Law proves destructive to Reventlov's positronic brain when he attempts to act upon it, as he couldn't tell whether his actions would save humanity or destroy it, resulting in a life-threatening "moral" conflict. Reventlov bestows his abilities to Olivaw, who over the course of 20,000 years adapts himself to be able to fully obey the Zeroth Law without the risk of shutdown. Together Olivaw and Reventlov imagine the science of "
psychohistory" or laws of humanics, that would enable them to execute the "Zeroth Law" in a quantitative sense. Years later this would be developed into practical application by
Hari Seldon.
For that time onward, Olivaw manipulates the galaxy with the help of his many robot allies. He sets up both the
Galactic Empire and
Gaia in order to create a society that doesn't need robots. Under the guise of
Eto Demerzel, he becomes the first minister to galactic Emperor
Cleon I and Stanel VI.
When Hari Seldon first comes to
Trantor, Olivaw, under the guise of reporter
Chetter Hummin (a play on the words "better" and "human"), convinces Hari that the Galactic Empire is dying and that psychohistory must be developed into a practical science in order to save it. As Hummin, he convinces Seldon that Cleon's first minister Eto Demerzel is pursuing him and that it's imperative for Hari to escape and to try making psychohistory practical. He introduces Hari to
Dors Venabili, who becomes Hari's friend, protector, and future wife. At the end of Seldon's "Flight" it's revealed that Hummin and Demerzel are actually the same person, and are both false identities of Olivaw. Demerzel appears again briefly in the epilogue to
Forward the Foundation, which says he was one of the many in attendance at Hari Seldon's funeral.
Olivaw appears once more in
Foundation and Earth, where
Golan Trevize and
Janov Pelorat from the Foundation eventually find the radioactive
Earth, and Daneel's base on the
Moon, and learn about his
paternalistic manipulations, including the settlement of
Alpha Centauri, the creation of
Gaia, and psychohistory.
Based on an independent timeline, Olivaw was 19,230 years old during the events of
Foundation and Earth. Olivaw is the
longest-living Asimov character. He is theoretically immortal, due to the fact that he's a robot. However, even his parts need replacing, including his brain, and he eventually has to use a biological body.
Isaac Asimov said that the reason Olivaw appeared so often in his books was that his readers and publishers begged it of him.
Further Information
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