First Benevolent AI in Fiction

Question

Inspired by First AI to not follow a command?, I was wondering when the first positive depictions of AI appeared? Fiction is littered with rebellious robots from HAL 9000 to Skynet to Ultron, negative portrayals are the most common trope from the beginnings of science fiction. 19th century authors such as Samuel Butler and George Elliot anticipated that an evolutionary AI might supplant us.

From Erewhon (1872):

Assume for the sake of argument that conscious beings have existed for some twenty million years: see what strides machines have made in the last thousand! May not the world last twenty million years longer? If so, what will they not in the end become? Is it not safer to nip the mischief in the bud and to forbid them further progress?

(The Butlerian Jihad in the Dune Universe, the crusade against thinking machines, is named after Samuel Butler).

The classical Greek Talos perhaps doesn't quite qualify. While it is certainly obedient to its creator it doesn't exhibit any kind of independent action or personality.

Frakenstein's Creature (1818), arguably the first AI in fiction, certainly has the capacity for empathy and compassion:

“I saw no cause for their unhappiness, but I was deeply affected by it. If such lovely creatures were miserable, it was less strange that I, an imperfect and solitary being, should be wretched.”

“The gentle manners and beauty of the cottagers greatly endeared them to me: when they were unhappy, I felt depressed; when they rejoiced, I sympathized in their joys.”

The Creature also rescues a child from drowning in a river but he is shot through the shoulder by the child's father, who assumes he means harm. It's this incident and his earlier rejections that causes the Creature to reject humanity and go on a murderous rampage. Although the Creature does ultimately repent its actions this disqualifies it.

Answer 1

1932: "The Last Evolution", a short story by John W. Campbell, Jr., first published in Amazing Stories, August 1932, available at the Internet Archive; text of story also available at Project Gutenberg.

In the future, intelligent machines serve their human masters faithfully:

It was 2538 years After the Year of the Son of Man. For six centuries mankind had been developing machines. The Ear-apparatus was discovered as early as seven hundred years before. The Eye came later, the Brain came much later. But by 2500, the machines had been developed to think, and act and work with perfect independence. Man lived on the products of the machine, and the machines lived to themselves very happily, and contentedly. Machines are designed to help and cooperate. It was easy to do the simple duties they needed to do that men might live well. And men had created them. Most of mankind were quite useless, for they lived in a world where no productive work was necessary. But games, athletic contests, adventure—these were the things they sought for their pleasure. Some of the poorer types of man gave themselves up wholly to pleasure and idleness—and to emotions. But man was a sturdy race, which had fought for existence through a million years, and the training of a million years does not slough quickly from any form of life, so their energies were bent to mock battles now, since real ones no longer existed.

The intelligent machines fight valiantly against the invading Outsiders and finally repel them, although they were unable to prevent them from exterminating humanity:

"So life began, and became intelligent, and built the machine which nature could not fashion by her Controls of Chance, and this day Life has done its duty, and now Nature, economically, has removed the parasite that would hold back the machines and divert their energies.

"Man is gone, and it is better, Trest," said Roal, dreaming again. "And I think we had best go soon."

"We, your heirs, have fought hard, and with all our powers to aid you, Last of Men, and we fought to save your race. We have failed, and as you truly say, Man and Life have this day and forever gone from this system.

"The Outsiders have no force, no weapon deadly to us, and we shall, from this time on, strive only to drive them out, and because we things of force and crystal and metal can think and change far more swiftly, they shall go, Last of Men.

"In your name, with the spirit of your race that has died out, we shall continue on through the unending ages, fulfilling the promise you saw, and completing the dreams you dreamt.

[. . . .]

"Life-form of greed, from another star you came, destroying forever the great race that created us, the Beings of Force and the Beings of Metal. Pure force am I. My Intelligence is beyond your comprehension, my memory is engraved in the very space, the fabric of space of which I am a part, mine is energy drawn from that same fabric.

"We, the heirs of man, alone are left; no man did you leave. Go now to your home planet, for see, your greatest ship, your flagship, is helpless before me."

Answer 2

The Tik Tok Man from Ozma of Oz - published in 1907 should be a contender.

He may be described by most as a mechanical man but he was able to speak,think and take actions on his own hence he does qualify as Artificial Intelligence.

He as a character was very much loyal to his "master" Dorothy -

He therefore can no more love or be loved than a sewing machine, but as a servant he is utterly truthful and loyal. He describes himself as a "slave" to Dorothy and defers to her.

Character description -

Tik-Tok (sometimes spelled Tiktok) is a round-bodied mechanical man made of copper, that runs on clockwork springs which periodically need to be wound, like a wind-up toy or a mechanical clock. He has separate windings for thought, action, and speech. Tik-Tok is unable to wind any of them up himself

Source

Answer 3

I don´t know if this is the first AI benevolent in movies, but is the first I registered... The "mother computer" of the spaceship in Red Planet was completely collaborative with the crew, this AI aided the she-captain of the mission to overcome serious dangers, and even the captain didn´t have a doubt in jumping into outer space to make a desperate rescue, knowing that the computer will aid without failure. This is far from the catastrophic decision of Hall 9000 jamming the gate on the face of the poor astronaut stucked out there, LOL. Cheers. GK.