Forum    Search    FAQ

Board index » Sluggy Related Forums » Sluggy Related Chat




Post new topic  Reply to topic  [ 2 posts ] 
 
Author Message
 Post subject: The Ethics of Matticide
 Post Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2010 9:54 am 
User avatar
Offline
Joined: Thu May 30, 2002 12:00 am
Posts: 358
Location: Dimension of Pun
(I wasn't sure if this was better suited for this forum or for Political Opinions and Opinionated Posts... mods, feel free to POOP this one out if you think it a drain on this forum. Ewww... fecal puns are ass-inine. Anywaste:)

I was thinking about the rather advanced AI in this dimension, complete with the joy Matty took in oppressing Riff, and I got to wondering about the ethical implications of wholesale bot killing. I mean, what would Brent Spiner think? I guess it's one thing if the bots are just completing their programming... without actually having the capacity of free will or independent thought. But at times, it seemed that Matty-bot and Sis-bot expressed some true emotion which was unnecessary for the efficient execution of their orders. Of course, maybe it's just a "personality quirk" programmed in, but to what end? It doesn't seem to make anyone happier, so why make Matty so malicious about overmedicating 758449?

So if it is true that the bots are all acting of their own free will, does it not also follow that each bot is a being with rights and that killing a bot should have some moral implication? And if so, does it make it somehow more justified to kill the bots who are willfully oppressing humans?

References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_(Star_Trek)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.I._Artif ... telligence
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Robot_(film)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Terminator
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicentennial_Man_(film)

Top 
   
 Post Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2010 11:15 am 
Offline
Joined: Fri Jul 20, 2007 6:54 am
Posts: 1375
Location: Finland
I'd offer this as a vague reference:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... sANonHuman

I'm usually into philosophical discussions like this, but in this case the world in question acts by such different rules I'm not sure I could even make the necessary mental adjustments to consider this very deeply. Even unquestionably real person's (like telemarketers') deaths can be treated humorously and shrugged off in Sluggy sometimes, and I also get the impression that there may be philosophical zombies, things that act as if they had a consciousness but don't have it, which I don't see as possible in the real world. If the Matties aren't those, then I'd bet at least Riff's speaking tools as such.

Top 
   
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
 
Post new topic  Reply to topic  [ 2 posts ] 

Board index » Sluggy Related Forums » Sluggy Related Chat


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Bing [Bot] and 1 guest

 
 

 
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot post attachments in this forum

Search for:
Jump to: