If we had droidsFollow

...and I mean any kind of droid or android like C3-PO or Data, or eeven replicans such as in Bladerunner..

would you treat them with respect? I mean, would you bother to apolojize to them if you accidentally kicked one.. would you talk to it and actually repect it's "opinion"? Would you be worried about seeming "rude" to it, such as interupting it's talking or just yelling at it like you would your car?


this stems from my observation of Han Solo and how he interacts with C3-P0 and basically treats himi like another machine and watching BattleStar Galactica which goes on about "love" and the matter of humans "falling in Love" with machines.

...and the fact that for some reason I always feel guilty at the gas pump if I don't respond to the machine asking me if I want a receipt (Yes or No)...

Maybe it is because I program computers for a living, but a droid is just another piece of hardware. Even if it appears to have a personality, that is only because some human told it to have one. Droids would be just another tool to accomplish whatever task I am working on at the time.

where did you get your personality?


have you ever seen the result of neglected children?

These androids display some sort of personality though. Data, C3-PO and R2D2 all at one point in time during those movies show some level of emotion. It’s harder to yell at R2D2 because the little guy rocks. C3-PO is a little bit ghay. And data was constantly trying to become more human. A walking, mono-tone talking toaster is not something that demands special treatment though.

Were you just watching I-Robot and smoking?

I have. In college I volunteered at a local organization that provided a safe place for latch-key kids in the rougher part of the city my college was in. The difference is that child still has a choice in the matter. One of the things we tried to teach them is they can do whatever they want with their life, they are not restricted by the circumstances they are in.

A machine is just that. Even at the level of complexity in Battlestar Galactica, I would have a hard time treating a Cylon as anything more than that. Like I said, it is due in part to my schooling and the personal studying I have done in the realm of artificial intelligence. With the right knowlege, I could easily wipe a droid's memory and program it to do whatever I want. It is possible to 'reprogram' a child, influence their thinking, but not at the fundamental level you can accomplish with a droid.

Edit: I do not think you should treat a droid with disrespect because it is 'just a machine.' But neither do I feel it should have the same status as a human. I liken it to animals. Most of us have no problem breeding them, hunting them, using them to our own ends. But there is a line where you are being cruel that a 'normal' person will not cross.

Edited, Fri Dec 30 13:04:57 2005 by Sarlos

Not sure whats worse the cheesy plot or the fact that its only PG-13.

I even say thank you to my toaster

thats only cause they're hungry and you must look edible

The RCLU, I shudder at the thought...

If it's a droid like R2D2 or C3PO or whatever, it's just a machine.

If it's a Fem-bot, that's another story...

Or This

My first instinct is that if we had real droids we'd all be unemployed.

However, to answer Kelvy, yes, I would. However, I don't think we'll ever build them. They would have to have essentially a brain, like ours, which can make connections (like a neural net) and thus the analogy to "programming" as we know it is a poor one.

But the shear number of connections (bits) needed is phenominal. The human brain has 100 billion neurons and each neuron has 1000 to 10,000 synapses. It would take a long time to train.

I ever get an android, you can't play with it.