# Stories where robots replace politicians **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 30, 2016, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326 "2016-07-30T20:50:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/1 "2016-07-30T20:50:19Z")
Isaac Asimov’s “Evidence” from 1946 was about the possibility that a robot was so humanlike that he could be elected President. His 1976 “The Tercentenary Incident” was more specific, with a robot double taking the place of an assassinated President. The theme of robot doubles taking over the world by duplicating politicians has been done to death since the 60s. Seems to me it has to be much older than that. I know of one before 1946, a 1944 Mickey Mouse newspaper strip set in the future in which Pegleg Pete (now with two legs) is going to use his Mekka Men to replace the real leaders. Those strips were so derivative of other gags that I can’t believe that’s original. What came before? ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/2 "2016-07-30T21:10:38Z")
Moved to CS at request of OP. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![wintertime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c68b51/32.png) [@wintertime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wintertime)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/3 "2016-07-30T21:48:47Z")
Is “[The Ablest Man in the World](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ablest_Man_in_the_World)” from 1879 within the boundaries of your interest? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/4 "2016-07-30T21:58:28Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Isaac Asimov’s “Evidence” from 1946 was about the possibility that a robot was so humanlike that he could be elected President. His 1976 “The Tercentenary Incident” was more specific, with a robot double taking the place of an assassinated President. > > The theme of robot doubles taking over the world by duplicating politicians has been done to death since the 60s. Just to prove your point, let me mention the MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE episode ‘Robot’, in which the dead Premier has been replaced by a flesh-and-blood impostor – but our heroes would have a hard time proving it, so they instead make it look like he’s been replaced by a _robot_ impostor, because that’s a comparatively easy sell, right? Ah, the '60s. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/5 "2016-07-30T22:05:10Z")
> [@wintertime](#): > > Is “[The Ablest Man in the World](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ablest_Man_in_the_World)” from 1879 within the boundaries of your interest? That’s not really a match, but it’s a fascinating find. Mitchell is well known in early sf circles, especially as author of “[The Tachypomp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tachypomp).” That does remind me I have to go through Bleiler’s books on early sf, which are indexed by topic. > [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > Just to prove your point, let me mention the MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE episode ‘Robot’, in which the dead Premier has been replaced by a flesh-and-blood impostor – but our heroes would have a hard time proving it, so they instead make it look like he’s been replaced by a _robot_ impostor, because that’s a comparatively easy sell, right? > > Ah, the '60s. Yeah, I’d be surprised if you didn’t find the plot in The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Get Smart and The Avengers and a dozen Marvel comics. ---
**Author:** ![Duke\_of\_Rat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Duke\_of\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke_of_Rat)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/6 "2016-07-30T22:07:20Z")
Nm… ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/7 "2016-07-30T22:47:29Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Yeah, I’d be surprised if you didn’t find the plot in The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Get Smart and The Avengers and a dozen Marvel comics. No, I agree; my point was, it was such a storytelling commonplace by then that the idea of a robot double standing in for the Premier was _easier_ for them to build a con around than the fact that a lookalike was just doing an impression of his voice. (Incidentally, how would you count that classic TWILIGHT ZONE episode where the mysterious Old Man In The Cave calling the shots for a whole community turns out to have been a computer all along?) ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/8 "2016-07-30T23:08:27Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > No, I agree; I was agreeing with you agreeing. It’s a mutual admiration society! > [@](#): > > (Incidentally, how would you count that classic TWILIGHT ZONE episode where the mysterious Old Man In The Cave calling the shots for a whole community turns out to have been a computer all along?) Doesn’t ring a bell. (Memory? What memory?) But that seems to be a different subgenre. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/9 "2016-07-30T23:17:22Z")
The name of the episode was, in fact, The Old Man In The Cave. [/hijack] ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2016, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/10 "2016-07-31T01:03:39Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Exapno** : > > His 1976 “The Tercentenary Incident” was more specific, with a robot double taking the place of an assassinated President. Huh, I thought I had read all of Asimov’s robot works, but that one doesn’t ring a bell. Where might one find it? ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2016, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/11 "2016-07-31T01:20:56Z")
It’s in _The Complete Robot_. You can also find it by Googling. ---
**Author:** ![wintertime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c68b51/32.png) [@wintertime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wintertime)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2016, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/12 "2016-07-31T15:07:00Z")
You’re quite right: it’s a common enough trope starting with the 1950s but early examples seem to escape me. The separate themes are all part of early SF: robots are mistaken for humans, artificial intelligence replaces human kind, and robots influence/make politics. J. Storer Clouston’s _Button Brains_ from 1933 is likely one of the earlier stories where a robot is mistaken for his human counterpart. The novel is humouristic and could be either the source or an early collection of jokes that deal with malfunctioning robots. Sydney Fowler Wright’s _Automata I-III_ (1929) deals with intelligent machines that take over the work of humans and become more and more their replacements. In Lester del Rey’s _Helen O’Loy_ (1938) a man falls in love with a robot resembling a human woman - this theme is far more developed than the one you mention: It goes back to _L’Eve Future_ by Auguste Villiers de l’Isle-Adam (1886), the story that popularized the term android. Though we could even go back to Olympia from E. T. A. Hoffman’s \*The Sandman \*(1816). The step from purely sexual object to political influence was taken with the female looking “Futura” in Thea von Harbou’s novel from 1926, which became renown as a movie: _Metropolis_ (1927) in which Hel/Maria incites the workers to riot and overcome the injust social order. But Futura is still not what you’re looking for. In \*Rex \*(1934) by Harl Vincent, a robotic entity uses its “marvelous mechanical brain” to rule the world but is overthrown/despairs before it is able to remake man in the image of robots. Not a match either - but closer to the trope that became so popular later. Interesting query, Exapno Mapcase. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2016, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stories-where-robots-replace-politicians/761326/13 "2016-07-31T17:11:34Z")
Thanks. That was an interesting list. Bleiler lists dozens of stories under the classification Robot, but doesn’t break out any one featuring a deliberate replacement. Misunderstandings go way back, and I agree that it all starts with Hoffmann with renewed interest in the theme after Offenbach’s opera _The Tales of Hoffmann_ debuted in 1881. The specific plot of replacement of leaders by robots for the purpose of ruling the world is not anything I can find. However, it occurs to me that Bill Walsh, the Mickey Mouse writer, must have been influenced by Charlie Chaplin imitating Hitler in _The Great Dictator_ only four years earlier. That theme goes back to _The Man in the Iron Mask_ and _The Prince and The Pauper_. A 1932 film, _The Phantom President_, has a dull candidate replaced by a charismatic showman in public. A short hop from there to a constructing a perfect double. It still bothers me that Bill Walsh, of all people, was the one to make it. Originality wasn’t one of his strong points.