i feel like people with android AUs and such, when debating the âare robots people?â argument, donât actually take into account that before you start arguing whether theyâre people or not (especially on the basis of their emotional depth or capability), you might first want to look at whether theyâre alive or not
we were doing frankenstein in english today and the lecturer pulled up a quote from the NASA website, which states the conditions of life as such:
âLiving things tend to be complex and highly organized. They have the ability to take in energy from the environment and transform it for growth and reproduction. Organisms tend toward homeostasis: an equilibrium of parameters that define their internal environment. Living creatures respond, and their stimulation fosters a reaction-like motion, recoil, and in advanced forms, learning. Life is reproductive, as some kind of copying is needed for evolution to take hold through a population's mutation and natural selection. To grow and develop, living creatures need foremost to be consumers, since growth includes changing biomass, creating new individuals, and the shedding of waste.
To qualify as a living thing, a creature must meet some variation for all these criteria. For example, a crystal can grow, reach equilibrium, and even move in response to stimuli, but lacks what commonly would be thought of as a biological nervous system.â
1. complexity
2. ability to absorb/consume energy in order to grow
3. reproduction
4. reacting to their environment
5. homeostasis
6. nervous system
you can argue at least some variation for all of these, itâs just that theyâre not all biological. if weâre talking like--advanced futuristic AI in the way most android AUs and such do, you can make a pretty solid case for all of these.
1. complexity pretty much speaks for itself- the android is presumably a complex system capable of developing and learning as well as communicating with people/other androids/etc.
2. presumably, the android requires some kind of power source or fuel. whether this is electricity or some other substance might vary, but generally speaking an android wonât exist indefinitely unless it has something to power it. it absorbs/consumes energy in order to keep functioning- and while it may not be able to physically grow or change, its internal system and intellect - its âbrainâ - will definitely grow.
3. reproduction, like growth, is one where definitions can be questioned- but an android can sure as shit âreproduceâ if it can create another android. things like uploading parts of itself into another android âbodyâ, etc, could all be argued as a form of reproduction. and if weâre talking reproduction as a means to continue a species, an android could probably create constant clones or copies of itself, even just digitally.
4. reacting to the environment is an obvious one too. you do a thing, the android reacts.
5. homeostasis is basically an internal balance, like the human bodyâs ability to maintain a consistent internal body temperature despite the temperature of the outside world. if you upset that equilibrium, the body deteriorates rapidly. while an android might not be subject to pain, and while it might be capable of surviving without parts of its body, it will still stop functioning if you disrupt parts of whatever is powering it- its central processing system or whatever the equivalent of its brain and other âorgansâ are.Â
6. as for a nervous system, an android or other AI might not have a biological one as most living things do, but you can certainly argue that it does have something similar in its programming, controlling everything it does, etc.
i wouldnât even call any of this âtwistingâ definitions so much as redefining them, and in a fictional world with seriously advanced AI, the definitions will have to be redefined. iâve seen characters and writers argue that robots in their universe are people âdespite not being aliveâ, but itâs actually not difficult to argue that they are alive. itâs just that the definitions of life and what it means to be âaliveâ are changing.
whether an android/robot/other AI counts as a person or not is an entirely different kettle of fish that i wonât get into just now, but you can probably guess it runs along the same vein of âhow do we define âpersonâ?â
