droid

Meanings

1. A robot, especially one made with some physical resemblance to a human (an android).
2. A person having the qualities of an android; one with few or no emotions or little personality, or who acts in an unthinking manner; a robot.

Etymology

Clipping of android (“robot designed to look and act like a human being”), coined by the American science fiction author Mari Wolf (born 1926) in the story “Robots of the World! Arise!” (1952), and popularized by the film Star Wars (later retitled Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope, 1977): see the quotations.