Icons, statues, badges, medals, amulets, and charms all perform magic. Some are displayed, some are carried in processions, and some are worn on the person. Many figure in horror fiction. A unique variant of the scapegoat idea is Oscar Wilde s fiction of the Picture of Dorian Gray in which a painting assumes the ugly changes in the appearance of a dissolute person. Allegories use animals with human attributes to teach moral lessons.
Totems are animals which represent groups of humans.
People have wanted to make artificial people for as long as recorded history. In ancient Egypt, priests stood in the hollow statue of a god and bellowed out the god's will. Disney World has lifelike machines acting out scenes from American history as well as other jackwork displays. Every toy store has mechanical dolls. The play is an ordinary sci-fi opus in which the mad scientist invents artificial people, lacking only souls, which he calls robots, to do the world's work.