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Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, published in 1968, is amazing. This book is the basis for Blade Runner, but the movie and the novel seem very separate to me and are masterpieces in their own way. The book takes place years after most of Earth has been destroyed by radioactive fallout from World War Terminus. To encourage people to emigrate to off-world colonies such as Mars, a special incentive is that each emigrant will receive an adroid (andy) as a servant.

Electric Sheep follows bounty hunter Rick Deckard, based in San Francisco, as he tries to track down renegade androids who killed their masters in Mars and have assumed human identities on Earth, and J.R. Isidore, a man who has suffered brain damage (considered a “special”) who lives in an abandoned building and comes in contact with the androids.

This book brings up a lot of questions on whether or not androids with such advanced technologies can have souls. What is the human condition? The novel is fast-paced and takes place all through one day where Rick Deckard even finds himself empathizing with the andys. At one point Rick finds himself in what seems to be an alternate universe, a self-sufficient police station that is run by androids and has his own identity as human or andy questioned.

This book is a three hour read tops. Personally, I happen to like the tone and pacing of the book more than Blade Runner, but I think they both have their merits. Having not seen Blade Runner in years, while reading Electric Sheep you didn’t even feel like you were that far in the future.

Anyway, incredibly thought-provoking.

Side note. Total Recall (starring our good friend Arnold Schwarzenegger) is based on Philip K. Dick’s short story ‘We Can Remember It For You Wholesale’ which I would like to read soon.