Kotaku is running an interesting series on Robots in Gaming this week, and one of the posts dealt with the three laws governing artificial intelligence, as laid out by Isaac Asimov in his series of very nerdy but very enjoyable books. They are as follows:

1) A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2) A robot must obey orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

The most prolific AI designers of our time are, of course, video game designers, so Kotaku asked a few of them if they had their own laws for creating video game AI. My favorite answer came from Todd Howard of Bethesda Studios:

"I'll give you one from the old Terminator games, since the new movie is coming out. The Terminator cannot be reasoned with, can't be bargained with, and cannot be stopped. Unless of course he hits a chair, and since he can't path around it, we have him just start shooting."

Check out the more fleshed out (but slightly less enjoyable) responses from Epic Games and Relic over at Kotaku.