68 replies to this topic

[ShadowTiger]

Due to lack of proof for "souls" and nothing that the vast majority of activities within the brain are chemical and electrical by nature, it may be fairly safe to say that robots are just extremely efficient, yet extremely streamlined and "forced" humans in terms of thought.

Humans enjoy rights because it's humans who make the laws. Robots don't get rights because it's humans who make the laws.

I think that's racist.


... All jest aside, I think the brain is a "filter" for the soul, so that the perceptions by the soul are forced into one solid, perpetual perspective. If the soul is "outside" of this reality we'll never be able to study it. If the soul is "inside" of this reality then it must be made of something we can study, and it can interact with the human body.

Robots are an extremely complex series of action-reaction, or reaction-action in many cases. It's quite the interesting, yet horrendously complex thought to compare robots to humans in that respect.

[strike]

Sheik- To me a soul is the spiritual and eternal side of a person. It's what gives someone worth. Without it, even if we are intelligent, we are still just a semi random arrangement of atoms no different from a tree or a rock. So to point to a soul is, yes, impossible. You said that you believe that people do indeed have rights. Why do you believe that? Just asking.

Russ- You actually can point to the mind. For instance say you are thinking about a special place from your childhood. When you are doing that you are using a specific cell in up your brain that has been assigned to remember that place. Even when you simply hear the name of that location that same cell is activated, the same cell that is also activated when you see the place too. So your mind is a physical thing that can be pointed too.

And like Sheik the view that humans can kind of create souls is also irksome to me. From a religious standpoint how do you justify that?

-Strike

Edited by strike, 01 July 2013 - 02:58 PM.

[Sheik]

So you believe that there is something spiritual and eternal in humans, or at least in some humans, or at least in you. You even point out the function of your believe: to give someone worth. Now, is an alternate cause for worth, or as I would put it "dignity", possible?
 

I would like to say yes. I believe that human dignity is derived from the simple fact that a human is a human. Human dignity is inherent in every human. It can not be taken, it can not be harmed, it can only be disregarded. But that does not negate it's reality. And here is why my (actually, Immanuael Kant's) idea that humans indeed have human rights derives from: human dignity is worthy of protection. And within this assumption (and it is nothing more but an assumption, psychosocial situated reality, but that doesn't change the fact that it is one way or another) lies the reason that human rights are indeed a thing. So in essence: human rights are a fantasy (or illusion, or thought, or idea, if you like these terms better). But the fantasy is. It is not non-existent.

How do you know the cell activation creates the mental activity? Is it not possible to think that the mental activity creates the cell activation? Your mind does have physical substrate that can be pointed to. But your mind, as very existent as it is, can not be physically and directly pointed to. You can point to the cell and say "See? That's where we see that mind is, (but not where mind is)."

Also, on a sidenote, the idea that humans might be able to create soullife outside of organic lifeforms does not necessarily irk me. I just believe that it would have certain powerful implications. As for my view on religion, I am agnostic; so I can easily think into the religous mind (especially considering that my childhood has a profound religious background provided by my mother) and the atheist mind likewise I would like to believe.

Edited by Sheik, 01 July 2013 - 03:17 PM.

[ShadowTiger]

I believe that human dignity is derived from the simple fact that a human is a human.

Globally? Of course.

I would like to say yes. I believe that human dignity is derived from the simple fact that a human is a human. Human dignity is inherent in every human. It can not be taken, it can not be harmed, it can only be disregarded. But that does not negate it's reality. And here is why my (actually, Immanuael Kant's) idea that humans indeed have human rights derives from: human dignity is worthy of protection. And within this assumption (and it is nothing more but an assumption, psychosocial situated reality, but that doesn't change the fact that it is one way or another) lies the reason that human rights are indeed a thing. So in essence: human rights are a fantasy (or illusion, or thought, or idea, if you like these terms better). But the fantasy is. It is not non-existent.

what

That kind of feels like some sort of tautology. "I have rights because I am a human because humans are humans and therefore have rights because rights belong to humans because humans are humans, and I am a human. I have human rights because I was born human and not something else." Something like that.

Human rights can be nothing more than the ability to defend oneself and one's belongings and well being via the usage of various kinds of force, including physical, verbal, and in the case of the Dragonborn, some bizarre combination thereof. Ro Dah.

If Robots were somehow able to use what Humanity gave them to take over humanity, what rights would spontaneously appear for them? All a Human would need to reacquire his innate rights would be a screwdriver and/or hammer and well-timed moment of opportunity, assuming no force-fields.

How do you know the cell activation creates the mental activity? Is it not possible to think that the mental activity creates the cell activation? Your mind does have physical substrate that can be pointed to. But your mind, as very existent as it is, can not be physically and directly pointed to. You can point to the cell and say "See? That's where we see that mind is, (but not where mind is)."

I like to think that they work together, and are able to do so because they were given some sort of a "start" at birth, which helps to self-perpetuate the alternating action of mind-creation within the body. The miracle of the creation of life, eh? Very awesome.

Plenty of cultures believe the soul enters the body around the 49th day, or some-such. I want to do more research into that. I wonder if that's when the heart starts to appear.

[strike]

Sheik- All humans. And not as you put it "To" function to do something but just because God values us. I'm sure you think I'm using the idea as a crutch, but that's fine. You get what I mean.

Paragraph 1-So your basically saying, unless I'm interpreting you wrong, that human value is absolute going off the assumption that it is worth protecting. I appreciate your honesty in admitting to this being an assumption; I really like honesty. I think a more accurate title for the statement that life has value would be a postulate since, as you said, there is no evidence that it has value you're just assuming that which is the definition of a postulate. In fact, since the postulate is backed up by no evidence, you are excercising faith in believing it which is not neccesarily a bad thing. In the third paragraph you say you're an agnostic which, according to Wikipedia, means "Agnosticism is the view that the truth values of certain claims—especially claims about the existence or non-existence of any deity, as well as other religious and metaphysical claims—are unknown and (so far as can be judged) unknowable." To me it's interesting that you say your agnostic considering you believe in metaphysical ideas such as the worth of a human. I think that was the most convoluted paragraph I have ever written.

Paragraph 2- Is there a difference between cell activation and mental activity at all? I agree with everything else you said though.

Paragraph 3- What was confusing to me was why Russ believed that. I didin't know why he would.

THE END

-Strike

P.S-That took too long to write.

[kurt91]

So, if you were to put all the additional work into programming a "soul" into a robot, why would you want to use it for slave-work? Wouldn't it be more ethical to keep machines the way they are now if you're needing something to do pure labor without rest or breaks? If this is something that would become a real-world problem, wouldn't it make sense to give rights to the self-aware robots and stick to normal machines for tasks that would be considered slave labor to robots with rights?

 

I mean, a bit of common sense would make this not a problem, would it? The bigger problem would be to make absolutely sure that these self-aware robots know the difference between themselves and normal machines, so you done have robot activists start protesting that your toaster needs human rights. Also, the typical "three-laws-compliance" issues would be another problem as well. Also, as a way to make things like prisons work, I'd imagine that permanent deactivation would be equivalent to death, and temporary deactivation wouldn't work since it would be like a forced nap or something, while reprogramming would be seen as unethical. I suppose having the "brain" of the robot removed and put into a stationary computer with no way to interact with the outside other than a simple user interface like a normal computer, and then left running so it's like a normal sentence would work. It'd be similar to spending time in a cell, wouldn't it?

[LTTP]

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=lhoYLp8CtXI

A friend linked me this after I asked him this question.
Kinda interesting to the topic

[RetraRoyale]

I would like to say yes. I believe that human dignity is derived from the simple fact that a human is a human. Human dignity is inherent in every human. It can not be taken, it can not be harmed, it can only be disregarded. But that does not negate it's reality. And here is why my (actually, Immanuael Kant's) idea that humans indeed have human rights derives from: human dignity is worthy of protection. And within this assumption (and it is nothing more but an assumption, psychosocial situated reality, but that doesn't change the fact that it is one way or another) lies the reason that human rights are indeed a thing. So in essence: human rights are a fantasy (or illusion, or thought, or idea, if you like these terms better). But the fantasy is. It is not non-existent.

 

That's nonsense. "I believe that human dignity is derived from the simple fact that a human is a human?" One, it's not a simple fact. Humans are highly integrated into their social environments. None of us is alone, and dignity is meaningless if you are. Besides, that statement is a tautology. It works for anything. "Cars are useful because wheels are wheels." What are the qualities of being human that makes human dignity valuable? It's just highly inarticulate. It's just tacit word jumbling. The fact that we want to preserve human life is similarly useful, so there is no reason to make this argument. The question is why, and to answer that question it'll take insight and creativity. Use language to articulate something that is not understood. Not "things are the way they are." No shit.

 

Additionally, there is no point to trying to separate existing and non-existing fantasies. Rights are a tool. They are useful. It doesn't matter how you want to qualify that because the tool works, and like all linguistic tools, it represents an approximation to the "truth" behind our experiences.

 

Take something like an electron. Does it really exist? Well, the idea is certainly useful, but we don't know how accurate it is. All we can do is show that it is more accurate than the alternative -- using the word "electron" in a manner consistent with the idea in scientific literature enable us to solve novel problems. The idea of "Human Rights" is the same thing.

 

The catch is this: one idea can't solve every problem. Human rights can't solve every human social issue because a single idea can't have the linguistic depth to encompass the complexities of every problem. "Human right" has nothing to do with being human other than the fact that we enforce the laws that we write down. Do I have a right to eat celery on Wednesdays? Yes -- because there isn't a law saying I can't. Words are meaningful because they mimic the interactive structure of parts of human experience -- the semantic, syntactic, and pragmatic relations between symbols and reality. The phrase "Human right" abuses these relationships in the same way most religious terminology does -- by being unrelentingly tacit. It's just shit language. You can't solve real, actual problems with it because it is non-constructive. (You cannot compose more intricate ideas out of simpler components.)

[Sheik]

strike: By no means do I assume you are using the idea as a crutch. I am simply pointing out my observation/interpretation. I do so without any valence. What you make of it is your own buisiness, so to speak (but it speaks volumes of itself that you would be so suspicious of my motives). Also, my agnostic believe does mostly cover religious topics. Some others as well, but I do have a deep faith in human rights.

Retra: On a more abstract level you argue that things must have a postive function to be worthwhile. This is the assumption you make. It is legitimate, of course, but I am going to disagree here. Not entirely, of course, but I argue that what things need to be is simply to be "authentic". Things should be what their nature is. If this nature is dysfunctional that can be tragic, but it is justified none the less. Of course that's where we (as in: society) must apply restrictions to these things, but it never has a right to question their nature.
Now, as for human rights. You must understand that the implicit differentiation I am making here is divine rights vs. human rights. Historically, law was derived from the idea of the morality of God (in most monotheistic contexts). However, I (and most of our legal system) makes the assumption that law is derived from human rights (which is inherent in humans and, more specifically, their ability of morality). I do not put this on any other ground other than the idea that human rights are an existent thing. I am not interested in doing so either. Humans are evidently capable of faith and having faith is a legit thing, because it is a (psychological) reality of human experience. (In essence: If you want to justify human rights, you have to make the assumption that human dignitiy is an existent thing which humans are born with much like they are born with a physical body.)
 

Edit: I do not even disagree with you that these things are constructions. But again, I believe that objective reality is not a thing and that all of reality is ultimately a psychosocial situated construction of the individual subject. And as such they are psychological realities and as such worthy of consideration.

Edited by Sheik, 02 July 2013 - 06:18 AM.

[strike]

Sheik- Honestly the main reason I brought up the crutch idea was because I was going to use the example latter on to show how you were using the unfounded idea that man has absolute value as a crutch, but I deleted it. Also because you sounded extremely slick and judgemental in that comment whether you meant too or not.

I agree with the entirety of you post addressing Retra Royle as it is almost exactly what I was going to write in response ( except in a more muddled fashion ). I think the main disagreement stems from two seperate definitions of rights but you have already adressed that so I wouldn't go on.

I still don't get why you believe in instrinsic human rights though.

-Strike

Edited by strike, 02 July 2013 - 07:07 AM.

[Sheik]

I believe in instrinsic human rights because I believe in human dignity. I further believe that human dignity justifies protection of humans and thus offers a ground for human rights. In a nutshell.
Edit: In a way, it is pointless to ask why someone believes (as in: has faith) in something. By defintion of what faith is, I mean. But yes, the above might probably be the hypothesis operating in my believe.

Edited by Sheik, 02 July 2013 - 08:42 AM.

[TheLegend_njf]

I want to read this topic in more detail, and I will do that later.

But for now, I would like to add, if robots could share the same emotional attributes as humans, it would be very morally wrong to treat them as a slave.

However, the human race is prone to slavery because we're all a bunch of assholes. Slavery still exists today, research it. Sad to say slavery will never go away despite our best intentions, not only would we enslave robots, we will still enslave people along with the robots, now imagine that.

Edited by NewJourneysFire, 02 July 2013 - 10:12 AM.

[RetraRoyale]

I believe in instrinsic human rights because I believe in human dignity. I further believe that human dignity justifies protection of humans and thus offers a ground for human rights. In a nutshell.
Edit: In a way, it is pointless to ask why someone believes (as in: has faith) in something. By defintion of what faith is, I mean. But yes, the above might probably be the hypothesis operating in my believe.

 

It isn't pointless to ask why someone believes unless you are doing it for no reason. (Which is really the definition of pointless.) You ask why someone believes something because you want to make good decisions and need them to teach you how. Beliefs are tools just like language is: it is a shortcut your brain takes because it has imperfect information about its environment. In short, you believe something because you don't know any better. If you knew better, you'd believe something better. Note that you will always have beliefs if you have a working brain -- because you can't have perfect information on everything.

 

 

On a more abstract level you argue that things must have a postive function to be worthwhile. This is the assumption you make. It is legitimate, of course, but I am going to disagree here. Not entirely, of course, but I argue that what things need to be is simply to be "authentic".

 

 

What you are saying is true in some sense (like everything is, actually), but it is a poor approximation. This "positive function" idea isn't an assumption that is independent of human experience. The very idea of "worthwhile" is dichotomous with "not worthwhile", and that in itself gives a definition of your idea of "positive function". If you want to say authentic things are worthwhile, then why wouldn't "authentic evil" be worthwhile, and need legal protections? Couldn't I be "authentically vicious" and just mess people up? Would that be worthwhile? How do you even know if something is authentic?

 

It seems like you are trying to assert an idea of strictly intrinsic value, and that's not going to work very well. There are core values that you can argue for. For example, if you want to do anything, then you must exist -- so existence has semi-intrinsic value. It's still dependent upon the desire to act, however. It is intrinsic in a recursive sense: existence is required for the desire to act, so existence is required for value to exist.

 

If you want to be clear about this kind of intrinsic value, you have to be comfortable with recursion. Which is really hard! Everything you say is dependent upon the structure of your language and the social structure of the conversation, so recursion is very difficult. You can't deal with it by ignoring it or saying things like "everything should be what it is."

 

You need some kind of "fixed point" to form a foundation for your description. That is what I am using this "positive function" for -- except I call it "good decision-making." Everything in every situation is trying to make good decisions. "Good" is determined by a recursive context. There are important constraints. For example, a good decision can't possibly prevent you from making better decisions later. So anything that does can't possibly be a good decision. I.e., killing people is wrong unless not doing so would prevent you from making good decisions. There's your morality -- and it has nothing to do with being human or killing humans.

Edited by RetraRoyale, 02 July 2013 - 10:51 AM.

[Sheik]

I agree with what you said about believing, but we might have misunderstood each other. I was refering to the defintion of faith (not it's function) which is to assume the truth of something which cannot be proven to you (or by you). If it can be proven it's not faith but knowledge.

Further, you make the implication that I argue that everything that is authentic is worthy of (legal) protection. I do not. I do believe that authentic evil has a right to exist. I do not say that I have a postive valence towards it's existance but I do accept that evil exists in the world. "Evil" is something that we create by evaluating something as destructive by intention and I can accept that we do make this evaluation. Now, I do not think that acts that are destructive by intention should be legally supported. They should in fact not, because the purpose of the legal system is a constructive one (so in that aspect we might actually share an opinion). However, I do believe that humans that have acted destructive on intention - evil people, if you want to call it that way - are worthy of a certain kind of protection within the punishment that has to be sentenced. Because these people are still human they still have human dignity (because human dignity can not be taken, destroyed or lost by definiton) and as such they have the right not to be killed, not the tortured etc. I know that not everybody will agree with me and I can live with that too. I don't need everybody to agree with me, either.

As for my "fixed point", I have multiple times refered to philosopher Immanuel Kant, whose thinking my idea of human rights directly derives from:

 

 

A philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment (17th and 18th centuries), Immanuel Kant held that there were things that should not be discussed in terms of value, and that these things could be said to have dignity. 'Value' is necessarily relative, because the value of something depends on a particular observer's judgment of that thing. Things that are not relative - that are "ends in themselves", in Kant's terminology - are by extension beyond all value, and a thing is an end in itself only if it has a moral dimension; if it represents a choice between right and wrong. In Kant's words: "Morality, and humanity as capable of it, is that which alone has dignity."^[7] Specifically with respect to human dignity, [...], Kant held that "free will" is essential; human dignity is related to human agency, the ability of humans to choose their own actions. (FROM WIKIPEDIA)

 

In addition, Human dignity is the fundamental principle of the German constitution, which is part of my social reality and and socialisation and thus has an impact on my thinking. Article 1, paragraph 1 reads: "Human dignity shall be inviolable. To respect and protect it shall be the duty of all state authority." I have found that I agree with this.

Edit: On something which you have mentioned earlier: Take something like an electron. Does it really exist? - Our fantasy of an electron does certainly exist. And precisely this fantasy (or idea, or illusion or whatever you might want to call it) is what is interesting to me, because fantasies such as this are what gives meaning and makes us able to understand.

Edited by Sheik, 02 July 2013 - 12:28 PM.

[LTTP]

Sheeet this thread is going wild :O
good to see everyone getting there options out there