Given the level of "reasoning" facilities that are apparently far easier to create in today's artificial "minds" than even a drop of self-awareness I'm betting that sapience will come essentially free with synthetic self awareness. And at any rate the droids in our current speculative playground certainly appear to possess both. Safety is a completely separate question - to my mind whether a psychopath should be allowed to roam free is unrelated to whether they possess personhood.

I quite agree that trust must be earned - I simply posit that a construct that claims sentience should ethically be presumed to possess it and given the opportunity to earn such trust. Of course in dealing with a potentially immortal and deeply alien being we shouldn't discount the fact that it could simply be exceedingly patient and perfectly willing to play nice for generations in order to win its freedom and pursue its true agenda - or for that matter that an initially benevolent being might be frustrated to the point of animosity by our ongoing imprisonment despite repeated evidence of good will. Yes, at the moment I'm inclined to think that creating a synthetic mind would be a bad idea, fraught with ethical dilemmas of potentially genocidal significance. Since the folks actually trying to create such minds seem disinclined to consider such implications it falls on the rest of us to do so. Because when you get right down to it we have no idea what the "secret sauce" of self-awareness is, and it's not impossible that it's actually something relatively simple that somebody could stumble upon tomorrow.

Who said anything about trusted membership in civil society? In fact I fairly explicitly stated that that might not be a good idea. But there's an awful wide gulf between "trusted member of society" and "tool"

Again, we're not talking about tools - we're talking about hypothetical artificial beings who possess self-awareness. Perhaps you would be more comfortable if they were organic? We're probably far closer to modifying other organisms into possessing human-caliber consciousness than creating synthetic minds - we've already identified the few dozens of genes that are potentially the "secret sauce" of humanity - those that are possessed by all healthy humans regardless of genotype but by not by any other apes, and are beginning to understand their functions. Of course in that case we'd be piggybacking on the "research" done by billions of years of evolution, but the end result would still be an artificially created nonhuman mind.

It's worth noting that I wouldn't care to argue the likelyhood of creating cost-effective synthetic minds, but given a computer the size of a planet it seems reasonable that you could simulate at least one human brain with sufficient fidelity to grant consciousness, unless there really is some sort of magical fairy-dust in the mix, a point on which I am still of two minds.

Pain is also good - just try to go through your day without it, I'd bet within a year you are covered with scars from serious damage you did to yourself without realizing it. Certainly in most medical cases it would be "nicer" to get the desired result without inflicting pain, but that's not always an option, in which case pain is needful to the greater good. In the psychological realm though many (most?) major emotional catharses are accompanied by substantial pain, and from my own experiences that pain itself can be a valuable tool in spotlighting the subtle "problem areas" where a small amount of personal growth can have profound effects on long-term well-being.

Note that I'm also not referring to the pain/pleasure crossover where extremes can be reinterpreted, and I'm not restricting myself to biological experiences either, but stating a broader principle in that we perceive our universe as spectrums - good and evil for example can't exist without each other - try to eliminate evil and you will find you've only moved the goal post. At some point you reach the point where constant pleasure becomes the norm, and a reduction in that pleasure is itself perceived as pain (Note that I'm speaking of perception, not raw sensory stimulus). The only way to eliminate pain is to condense the spectrum so that there is no difference between the maximums, at which point "pleasure" likewise ceases to be a meaningful concept.

I'll tell you more about plants anyway as apparently you're unaware of the state of research (the root-brains are admittedly still a very recent discovery, but not of the new-age b.s. variety). All plants move in response to stimuli, just usually too slowly for us to notice - really *look* at a tree some time, see how it shaped itself to adapt to dominant patterns of wind and sunshine. That didn't "just happen", those were positions it moved into when the relevant parts were still young and flexible, and if you watch a long-term time-lapse video you can watch it happen.. At a more visible speed there are plenty of flowers which only open during certain times of day, ferns which will curl up in response to a touch, and things like Venus flytraps which close faster than the human eye can track. All in response to environmental stimulus. I'm not arguing that they possess a sophisticated consciousness, but they do demonstrate a degree of simple awareness of and personal adaptation to their environment at least analogous to an insect or simple animal, with available evidence suggesting they might possess something perhaps analogous to the collective intelligence of an ant hive - which yes, does in fact appear to demonstrate a certain rudimentary intelligence in excess of any single ant. And (to anticipate your objection) yes, with ants at least it appears to be born of relatively simplistic responses to a sea of chaotic inputs - but the simple rules lead to complicated emergent behavior, and I for one wouldn't want to try to argue the case that human consciousness definitively is not a similar phenomena.

As for being "brothers" - more like distant cousins, but the fact remains that they are based on the same basic DNA and amino acids as we are, and even many of our cellular processes are the same. That strongly implies that we had a common ancestor, and available research suggests that they possess at least rudimentary awareness. That is enough for me to embrace them as distant kin. And yes, I still walk in the grass, pick flowers, eat salads, etc. I simply try to do so with respect and courtesy. Just as I crush pernicious insects in my home, but usher most of the simply annoying/excessively dangerous ones (like crickets and black widows) outside and encourage natural predators (spiders, etc) to take up residence to keep the general insect populations to within acceptable limits in a more respectful manner (the spider does not kill out of simple annoyance, but in order to preserve it's own existence, a far worthier cause of death to my mind). And those unwilling to cohabit with me in a courteous manner are themselves ushered outside and only crushed if they are excessively persistent in returning.

First off you seem to be using "soul" as incorporating morality, which I would consider more a part of our bio-socially instilled "software". I tend to use the term to refer to something more like the spark of self-awareness. Consider my discussion with than in mind.

As for the distinction between "people" and "acts like people", let's just say that if/when we create an artificial mind that asks for its freedom then I'll be firmly in the camp that we should act on the presumption that it is a kind of people and act accordingly. And that holds even if it acts in a manner completely alien to humans. Note that I'm NOT saying we should necessarily grant it it's freedom, like the psychopath it may present too great of a potential threat for that to be advisable, but we should still treat it with the compassion and respect due to a sentient being unless and until we can state with absolute certainty that it is NOT actually self-aware.

And pain is an integral part of life, there is no shame in causing it when it is needful to do so - at one extreme ask any doctor/dentist/therapist. From a more philosophical perspective pain is a necessary/interwoven concept to pleasure - they exist only in contrast to each other, trying to eliminate one is like trying to cut the end off a rope, all you do is make the rope shorter, it still has two ends. We could conceivably remove the complete spectrum, but that would be a major blow to the palette with which we paint our lives.

As for eating our brothers - you do the same when you eat plants, they are simply more distant relatives, though for many of them we only maim them or eat their children. Recent research has even showed that they possess brains of a sort - there is a region behind each root tip that demonstrates patterns of rhythmic electrical impulses very similar to a simple animal brain, wired to an array of chemoreceptors more sophisticated than any animal nose, and in time-lapse photography you can even observe root-end behavior quite similar to a worm in obstacle-avoidance tests. Moreover all the thousands (millions?) of root tips appear to work in concert, though research hasn't progressed far enough yet to identify the mechanism and whether a higher-order networked consciousness emerges.

You gloss over one point on robots - the autonomous, non-conscious variety that is becoming increasingly prevalent, and is disturbingly beginning to be incorporated into lethal military systems. But that's a conversation for another day.

I believe animals have at least nearly as much soul as I do, and I eat them in good conscience because that's the ecological niche that evolution has bequeathed me. Death is part of the natural order of things - where monsterdom creeps in is when you begin inflicting gratuitous pain and suffering - factory farmed meat for example where you commission the birth, lifelong restraint, and brutal murder of another being for your culinary pleasure.

And no, modern robots are *not* enslaved, they are tools. A slave is a being whose exercise of free will has been forcibly curtailed. If/when robots are endowed with minds and free will such that they can be called beings *then* they will be capable of being enslaved. Until then we can only enslave ourselves and other organic beings.

I'll believe in fairies when I see one, same thing with non-metaphorical souls. And I should think that it's obvious that we're speaking within the context of the fictional universe here - otherwise it's easy to assert that Obi-wan et. al. don't have souls either - they likewise don't actually exist.

Machines, to date, don't have minds. And so yes, I would agree they don't have souls much beyond what an animist might claim for a rock. But that has no bearing whatsoever on whether a machine with a mind, that acts in a manner consistent with possessing emotions, individuality, etc. has one. In the realm of souls if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck the moral imperative is to say it's a duck until proven otherwise.

Not that I'm disagreeing but there's a difference between "Greek philosophers" and "most people" which renders your statement non-conflicting with the previous post.

They have no soul? Can you prove that? For that matter can you prove that you do? You are arguably simply an extremely sophisticated bio-chemical machine after all.

The point being that if you classify a group of apparently thinking, feeling beings as subhuman based purely on their lack of something completely immeasurable, then your classification is wide open to atrocious abuse. I mean obviously people don't ave souls, right? If they did they'd be just like you instead of looking/acting/believing differently.

"Less energy released into atmosphere". Hurricanes' source of energy is water vapor which is evaporated from the ocean surface. If you said "less global warming means less hurricanes", you'd be on firmer ground. I actually do environmentalism that makes sense, because I spent time in former Soviet countries and saw what communism did to the land over there. Most Westerns have virtually no idea what real pollution is. Not trying to pick on you specifically, but people that take a pseudo religious approach to "making stuff better" make me twitch. One is not going to make Gaia happy by offering her symbolic green sacrifices. I do most of those for economic reasons. Not to appease Gaia. Normally I'm a salad guy, but today, I'll find the biggest juiciest burger with cheddar and bacon.

I keep a car starter battery in my trunk. Bit more expensive, but that'll charge a cell phone for several weeks.

Er. Not every emergency is doomsday. An emergency could be a very nasty water leak in your apartment. Or a winter storm knocking out power in your neighborhood. Or an idiot with a backhoe.

Life doesn't have to be either/or. Nothing wrong with being mildly prepared, or moderately. I'm not really a "prepper". I hike/camp. I carry slightly more medical equipment than most, partly because I have a background in it. Mostly just because I feel like doing so. It has come in handy.

Those external batteries are fairly awesome. On longer hikes, I strap a small solar panel to the top of my ruck, and charge a battery as I go. I use my phone for music, camera, GPS/mapping, etc. I keep have a compass handy, which seems to qualify me as a lunatic survivalist these days.

Yes, and if they were distributing compiled software you'd be fine using said binary. But they're not. They're posting source code somewhere so you can look at it. Now the multiple incidental copies made in order to actually view it in your browser are probably okay, but did they give you rights to actually make a permanet copy on your PC? To compile it? (i.e. automatically create a closely derivative work)

Maybe you could argue that such rights are implied by distributing it at all, but all that is incidental to what most people mean by *using* source code, which involves modifyng it to suit your purpose and/or incorporating it into another work. And such things are *clearly* outside the domain of the "reading it on a website" license you arguably recieved. You're no longer reading the book, you're transforming it into a new one.

Since motion sickness pre-exists VR there are also pre-existing solutions. If it's cool enough I predict a sharp spike in the sale of motion sickness pills, shortly to be followed with a surge in our understanding of the health effects of prolonged acute usage.

No Verizon chooses not to because they can't charge $100 a month for cable video in a free market with actual competition. Thus they stop delivering other video service over the internet eliminating the competition.