For the sake of argument assume the creature in the image has the mental capacity and instincts of a cat.
Ignore genetics, if you sequenced its DNA it would more closely match a banana than a human or a cat because some very clever people have gone to a lot of trouble to make it that way.
Is this slavery, animal abuse, or just a cat for sale?
Now what if I tell you it's a robot with a simulated cat's brain AI, does this change your answer?
What if it's the same cat AI but in a cat's body?
How smart does a genetically modified or artificially simulated cat need to before it's not just an animal anymore?
keeping a pet that looks like a 10-year old girl? Regardless of the level of consciouses of that creature I would say it's both animal abuse and creepy af. In my opinion, keeping any type of animal as a pet is a form of slavery/imprisonment. Animals, like humans, want to be free and autonomous. That picture embodies a fully submissive, helpless creature (just like pet owners like their animals), tapping into perverse aspects of human nature – an insult to human dignity.
The point of this is to explore the limits of what society deems permissible so as to come to a practical definition of "human", a definition to put into practice by legally enforcing it.
I'm a genetic engineer trying to get rich, your moral condemnation means nothing to me, now tell me why I can't make and sell cat-girls.
Look at the House Elves in Harry Potter; some of them want to be free (Dobby), but, because of presumably messed up things the wizards did in the past, modern House Elves naturally want to serve and to be slaves. Most of them view freedom as an enormous punishment and will fall into a depressed stupor if their master "releases" them. So, if you could engineer a creature that was happy with being owned, then sure, why not.
This is an obvious example of what fate should be of cute girls by some people thinking and how to create them (girls) so as not to feel remorse that we are perceiving people this way.
Let's change the DNA. For a banana.
Dumb it down. Well, to the cat's level. A cat is not total fool, you know. Sometimes even ... it dominates.
Now careful, you wanna do a robot with a cat's brain or no... a robot in the cat's body. Well - now that's dehumanizing max.
Only somehow it looks like a little girl. Well, don't care let's sell.
A legal precedent when someone in the will from the alleged love leaves all wealth to The Banana (Robocat's IQ class) with the face of a little girl.
But they can be made for other things. Like keep still and hold jug with flowers. Over there on my porch. When raining.
The image is purposefully outrageous, it's an example of how genetic engineering could be abused meant to inspire a discussion about how such abuse could be prevented, by defining the limits of what is permissible and the philosophical basis for those limits.
(here I'm just repeating my previous post)
I don't know what's more amusing, your misguided edgy moral victory or Hado giving your post the thumbs up like this is Facebook.
Honestly more than the cat girl I find your style that's annoying. Stop trying so hard to shock people and then pretend it was all for the sake of some higher discussion. It's quite transparent.
Admit it, if there's any way to use rape, bestiality or any of your other pet grotesque analogies to illustrate a particular point, you will find a way to shoehorn it in.
Believe me, I'd much rather be talking about genetic engineerring, but your presentation makes legitimate conversation on the topic impossible.
Your first post was a hilariously inept personal attack and after I called you out on it you're doubling down, if anyone here has issues it's you, specifically with me.
Admit it, if there's any way to use rape, bestiality or any of your other pet grotesque analogies to explain a particular point, you will find a way to shoehorn it in.
Well it seemed to be going fine until you showed up.
And you're liking everyone's posts except mine, omg are we really doing this?
Are we having a Facebook likes battle?
Are you trying to rouse a mob?
As much as this is fluffing my ego I don't really want to do this song & dance again, if you think my posting style is legitimately out of line then just close the thread and if you don't think that's necessary either contribute to the discussion or go away.
It depends on what is meant by "smart", something doesn't have to be smart to experience pain, fear, joy or depression. I know for certain when my cat is depressed, for example. If I have been too busy at work and neglected playtime, he will become apathetic and just sleep a lot to pass the time. When I have a few days off and spend time bonding with him, he becomes a different cat. His personality becomes noticeably strong, and his repertoire of emotional expression is highly complex, to say the least. I have learnt an enormous amount about emotional impacts through the observations of my cat.
This is also the reason why I have never gambled with unprotected sex, for example. I never wanted to find myself in the position where my stupidity could potentially have caused the inception and likely resulting suffering of another living being. I would never have forgiven myself for removing the result of my own irresponsibility. I have therefore chosen a life without children, or would rather have adopted if I had the means. I got my cat from a cat rescue place, so I am hoping that the life I can give him would be better than the life he had in the cat centre, where he spent his time hiding scared, in the dark under a shelf. I would never keep a pet otherwise, and I feel guilty even now for not being able to look after him as well as I should be.
But if something doesn't express emotion in a language that is recogniseable to humans, we just assume there is no impact. Science has been notoriously adept at 'dehumanising' animals by separating and distinguishing the human experience from other animals, and even going as far as claiming this as a more 'ethical' way of approaching the problem. That is, the lack of proof of common experience becomes justification for treating animals as if they don't. As a trained scientist, I sincerely struggle with this 'logic', because it just isn't that logical to me. I cannot even stand to watch an insect suffer, and this is not me anthropomorphising the insect, it is simply observing the pain of another living being and recognising it as suffering. It does not matter if the animal is experiencing it the same or not - how can I safely assume that it doesn't? I find this logic extremely contradictory, and this is a reason why I only work with long dead/extinct animals.
So of course, putting a young girl's face on a cat/robot thingy is going to get people worked up, but if the creature had the face of an insect or a snake, there probably wouldn't be much of a reaction. Meanwhile, an alarming amount of insects are going extinct around the world at catastrophic levels and nobody cares. We will only care when we no longer see the birds, frogs and amphibians, and all the other life forms that rely on insects as food source, or when plagues become too obvious to ignore. Or when there are no insects or birds left to pollinate the vegetation we rely on for food and oxygen production, or just to cool the temperature down. We are fucked, and this is not an exaggeration.
Anyway, doomsday predictions aside, according to the above rationale, the only sensible conclusion would be that an artificially created intelligence could potentially experience suffering, even if we assumed it wouldn't. I have always been doubtful that artificial configurations of inorganic matter could reach the level of complexity necessary for life, and thus, potential for suffering -- but it would be very foolish to assume we would never get to that point.
Well doubt is an emotion, you feel doubt when you're uncertain about something, you experience doubt as a feeling even though it's not a sensation like feeling hot or cold, you can't explain to anyone what doubt feels like only describe scenarios that prompt doubt and yet somehow that's enough, somehow we all know what "doubt" is even though we have no way of conveying what doubt feels like.
Some programs can "feel" doubt, particularly with avionics it's essential that your control system not only works with the information available to it but it also treats that information with some degree of skepticism. A normal logical program takes inputs, processes those inputs and returns an output, it's essentially an equation you put the numbers into the algorithm and it spits out the calculated answer. But this doesn't work if those inputs are unreliable and in the real world nothing's truly reliable which is a huge problem for avionics systems because if the inputs are wrong then the outputs will be wrong and that can be disastrous.
So an avionics system needs to understand that its inputs aren't necessarily true and that its outputs aren't necessarily right and this is done by having it calculate a factor of uncertainty. This factor of uncertainty is based on analysis of its own inputs and outputs over time so when a failure occurs it can compare its current unusual circumstances to normal circumstances and thus identify the likely point of failure and respond in a sensible manner.
It's hard to believe a variable (more like a range of variables) in a computer program is being felt by the computer but that factor of uncertainty that's what doubt is, that is the entirety of what doubt is, feeling doubt is nothing but the experience of uncertainty.
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