Some Random Thoughts

I wanted to respond to a comment http://www.haloscan.com/comments/qballqsp/111336203012528255/) James made on my April 12^th blog post (http://scifiblogs05.blogspot.com/2005/04/cultural-differences-and-raman.html). He asked whether I agreed with the point that “there exists such a thing as morality which has the power to be applied universally and to determine the right course of action.” I do agree with this point. I mentioned the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in my blog post and I do support this document because I am of the belief that there is a universal code of morality that all people should follow. I think this code is the creation of humankind as a whole. Its values reflect those common morals and principles that all people share, such as the golden rule. As to the example of Muslim women and their right to education, preventing women from being education or granting them fewer rights than men is not a value of Muslim culture. That is a perversion of Muslim culture. If you look at any religion or belief system, including Islam, I believe that you will find the same values at their core. Notice, however, that I used the term humankind earlier. I do not know if the human universal code of universality should apply to other species. The piggies, for example, may have a universal piggie code of conduct that applies across different tribes. As to Lennea’s comments (same url) on that same post, I agree. She said that there are two sides of the argument, “allowing people to follow their own traditional cultural practices” and “an undeniable desire to impose one's own beliefs on others. I think that it is difficult to determine when one standard should be applied, and when the other.” It is indeed difficult to make that distinction though I disagree with the use of the word impose. As I said, there might be a different belief system for piggies. But the universal moral code of human codes is not imposed on anyone because it is deciding by consensus, by humankind as a whole.

As to Terminator 2, it was my first time seeing it, and despite the fact that it had the laughable Governor of California in it, it was very cool. I thought one point was interesting was when the kid asks Arnold is he can learn to behave like a human “so he doesn’t act like a dork and stuff.” Arnold replies that he has a program that allows him to go through a learning process. Yet, he still does not act like a normal human being, instead sounding like a machine. This could be Arnold’s horrible acting or it could be a result of his programming. Is it possible for machines designed only for killing to behave like normal human beings? Is it possible for machines designed only for killing to behave like normal human beings? Arnold says that he feels no emotion because he “has to stay functional to fulfill his programming? Thinking back to He, She, and It, the only cyborg that acted like a believable human being was Yod, and in that case, the dose of compassion and empathy that allows Yod to pass as human limits his effectiveness as a killing machine.