I think this is key to Asimov's writing in general. The robot stories were logic puzzles and exercises in exploring the logical consequences of the Three Laws. To be generous, I would say they are *intended* to be wholly-formed worlds or to constitute the basis for a major genre of literature...
goodness, I see that I left out a key word: "To be generous, I would say they are not *intended*..."
Foundation, too. The first consists of standalone chapters (set years apart) each of which is a potted detective story (& expands a bit on psychohistory). But they're the kind of whodunit where the reader doesn't have enuf info to participate; we're just supposed to be wowed by the protag's skills.
Yeah, the robot ones are better because they often do center on clever ways of circumventing the Three Laws that actually can be deduced
The three laws are much better concept than psychohistory because they make good basis for stories about them being circumvented or their unexpected interpretation leading to malfunction etc. with clear constraints on the mystery instead of deus ex machina solutions like Seldon’s
and in the Bailey/Olivaw robot *novels*, the Three Laws-based whodunit part also holds up much better than his weird take on future Earth society
Agreed, and yes, "deus ex machina" is the term I was looking for. It's frustrating to read a whodunit solved by "deus ex machina", and it rather misses the point of the genre. The Three Laws were a key exercise in thinking aloud about consequences of robotics, and as such are still valuable today.
literally ex the Seldon vault machine