With the technology to create such a realistic copy of someone after they die, it is just a matter of time before a copy of a living person is created. Following the same logic as "Be Right Back", this doppelganger would be based on images of the subject with their online persona as a guideline. This means they would not be a perfect copy, but rather, another version of the subject, and in all likelihood they would look the same, if not better than the original and may even act better than the original. But what are the social implications of such a technology?
Imagine for a moment if there was a copy of you that was better in every possible way, including looks. Suddenly, this technology is no longer a grieving mechanism but a "people-maker". How would you feel? Would you resent this robot? Would you try to kill this robot? I feel like the majority of people would say yes to these questions which makes me wonder, why? What makes you more human than your doppelganger? If this so-called-robot truly can be better than us, why do we hate them? Why do we reject their humanity? This robot would be a model citizen, incapable of violence and crime. Many people would argue that humans are imperfect creatures. Or that our flaws make us who we are. However, I would say that humanity has just been conditioned to think this as a way to rationalize our faults.
What if a robot of this nature is the next step in evolution? A so-called "homo machinus". What if every person on this planet was slowly replaced with their own version of Ash2? What would that world look like? I would imagine a world free from crime and violence. If people were born in artificial bodies, would death still exist? People could replace their broken or outdated body parts. Hunger would cease to exist. Pain and suffering would disappear. I would argue that there are very few downsides to counteract the incredible amount of good a world of Ash2's would do.
4 comments:
Very good points! I believe that a world without crime and hunger would be amazing! Yes humans have flaws and we do rationalize our faults, but I think that's what defines humanity: not being perfect. So if we do evolve, will it still be considered humanity or would it be something along the lines of mechanical-humanity?
Also I think it ironic that while writing this comment there is the Turing Test that says to check the box to prove "I'm not a robot"
@Allson Dufour I feel like that is an important question to ask. It is very difficult to define humanity because no one is quite sure what it means to be human. But we need to ask these questions before it is too late to ask them.
Also i am not convinced that to be human, you must be flawed. That implies that humans are inherently bad, which may apply in many scenarios but I do not believe it is a universal truth. A world of Ash2's sounds frightening but it removes so much pain and suffering. Why are humans so determined to retain their flaws when they know it will harm so many people. If a moral action is an action that minimizes suffering, wouldn't the end of suffering be the most moral action?
The only reason for not wanting this outcome would be over-population, modification of laws, and humans becoming jealous. However, humans do a great job of causing enough wars to kill each other to prevent this. In fact the addition of theses model citizens into society could help humans understand each other better. One would be able to see the flaws within him or herself, and then would be able to fix them. Humans do not really care for one another as much as we want to believe. We have done many incredible discoveries, but if we really did care so much for the problems going on around the world, more people would be travelling to poor countries instead of France and Spain. Humans in essence have caused more damage to the planet in these few years than just about any other species. Then, why would having these model citizens be so bad if we can learn from them?
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