Writer's Block: Humans and Cylons
Jan. 16th, 2009 10:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fajrdrako[Error: unknown template qotd]
Well - that question has been the basis of many a science fiction story, and not just Battlestar Galactica - add to the list Star Trek in various incarnations, Terminator, AI, The Iron Giant (my favourite) and so on - in a probably infinite list. It's akin to the likes of E.T. and King Kong.
Obviously, there is no point where any individual, or culture, decides that a creature is sentient. Other races, species, alien life and non-life - there's no rule, and even when we make rules, there's no way to enforce their acceptance. Give me the day when people stop dropping bombs on other people and I'll answer a question about 'feelings and rights'.
Boil the question down to its deepest philosophical point. I think the value in our individual lives lies in treating everything as worthy of reference, living nor not. Dispense with definitions. The criteria should not be whether we can communicate with something, or relate to it, or whether it is useful to us to destroy it, or whether we love it or fear it. The criterion should be the universal validity of all existence, living or not, sentient or not.
This is why I call myself a pantheist.
Well - that question has been the basis of many a science fiction story, and not just Battlestar Galactica - add to the list Star Trek in various incarnations, Terminator, AI, The Iron Giant (my favourite) and so on - in a probably infinite list. It's akin to the likes of E.T. and King Kong.
Obviously, there is no point where any individual, or culture, decides that a creature is sentient. Other races, species, alien life and non-life - there's no rule, and even when we make rules, there's no way to enforce their acceptance. Give me the day when people stop dropping bombs on other people and I'll answer a question about 'feelings and rights'.
Boil the question down to its deepest philosophical point. I think the value in our individual lives lies in treating everything as worthy of reference, living nor not. Dispense with definitions. The criteria should not be whether we can communicate with something, or relate to it, or whether it is useful to us to destroy it, or whether we love it or fear it. The criterion should be the universal validity of all existence, living or not, sentient or not.
This is why I call myself a pantheist.
