Can you rape a machine?

[Stravo]

Brought on by a casual comment by the XO on the Pegasus in nBSG when he is reminded that the accused stopped the rape of a Cylon. He shrugs his shoulders and states simply "You can't rape a machine."

Cylons are artificial organisms, advanced AI's that have displayed emotions, reason, self awareness and even faith in a higher being. They are however, machines in essence.

So does a machine, no matter how highly advanced have rights? Can a robot woman, created with an advanced AI that at least makes her believe she is a person, gives her personality and facimsile of emotions be raped? Does she have a right to say no or more to the point can she ever be more than chattel?

Are those that view Cylons as "like us" only falling for a very attractive exterior? Afterall we never see anyone campaigning for equal rights for the imposing machine Centurions.

Where do you draw the line on machine intelliegence and human rights, in essence when can you treat a machine like a person and not a thing? What are your criteria?

[Covenant]

I think that it's as much in the intent as it is in the result. A behavior can be deviant even when there's no actual physical person, such as--I don't know--child porn or something. A machine that cries, acts like a person in distress, and screams at the terror of being raped? Yeah, I'm pretty sure that you're not allowed to abuse something like that. It seems like allowing that behavior on a machine that looks and acts like a person would encourage people to act that way otherwise... but I'm frankly not sure.

It's a form of abuse nonetheless. We give animals rights too, like you can't torture kittens or dogs. I see no reason to distinguish between 'human rights' and 'animal rights' and 'machine rights' in that sense.

I can kill ants all day if I want, I don't think people will argue that I'm doing something deviant there. Maybe a little creepy if it's slow or cruel or something. But isn't it about minimizing pain and cruelty? If a machine can think, doesn't it have at least the same rights as a dog? Dogs are property. Also, children aren't afforded full rights until they're older. And some mentally handicapped people are more strictly controlled. Don't we grant rights based on the ability to reason and decide things for yourself?

And if a machine can do that, and understands what it means to be violated, and doesn't wish to... how is it not rape, any more than it would be on a mentally handicapped person, or someone in a coma--who has, if anything, more in similar with a toaster than a Cylon does?

[Gil Hamilton]

Regard of their original construction, it is rape, because the machine is unwilling and it is certainly sex. Note the word "unwilling", implying "will" the base of sentience. Yes, they can be raped, if they have their own will and can have sex.

The XOs comment comes from the notion, fuelled by the fact they've demonized their enemy, that the Cylons are things. Wind up toys. However, their actions are contradictory. The crew of the Pegasus wasn't just violent toward Gina, they were vicious. You don't get that sort of malice toward an object, animate or not. They knew they were causing pain and trauma, it was appearant in all their actions, which would be pointless if they really thought the Cylons were things. If they accepted them as people, regardless of the horrible things the Cylons had done, they'd have to account for their own horrible actions. They call them "things" because they need to live with themselves and justify their actions, aside from it making it easier to kill the Cylons.

[Admiral Valdemar]

I expect a great deal of this can stem from any deep look into what self is and whether a machine can be truly like a human. Since the Cylons, the human form ones, are obviously capable of emotion and affection and rational or irrational thought, it is much the same as Replicants from Blade Runner. They have excelled past what we thought of them and evolved to be more like us, as these obvious synthetic organisms show.

[RedImperator]

The humanoid Cylons have virtually identical biochemistry to humans, to the point that they're interfertile with us to a limited extent. Gina is not a machine any more than Baltar is a pikaia. This is before you consider that machine or not, Gina is self-aware, possesses free will, and is obviously capable of suffering. Fisk's rationalization is complete bullshit.

[Admiral Valdemar]

...But entirely understandable. The last thing you do with a sworn enemy is to humanise them and as we see in wars like Vietnam, it's best to think of them as things like "toasters" rather than something more. When you start feeling pity for the guy trying to kill you, you become a liability.

They did a morally reprehensible act. It wasn't something unexpected, even on the 13th colony.

[Steven Snyder]

Cylons are artificial organisms, advanced AI's that have displayed emotions, reason, self awareness and even faith in a higher being. They are however, machines in essence.

Stravo, what is your criteria for labeling a cylon a 'machine' and a human otherwise?

So does a machine, no matter how highly advanced have rights?

I think that any sentient being should have at least some degree of rights. If an artificial being has advanced to the point where it is self-aware, then it really isn't an object anymore but an individual.

[Gil Hamilton]

...But entirely understandable. The last thing you do with a sworn enemy is to humanise them and as we see in wars like Vietnam, it's best to think of them as things like "toasters" rather than something more. When you start feeling pity for the guy trying to kill you, you become a liability.

They did a morally reprehensible act. It wasn't something unexpected, even on the 13th colony.

I don't consider their actions understandable. Regardless of what the Cylons had done, Gina and then Sharon were captured prisoners. Even nuclear destruction doesn't change the magnitude of their own actions nor make them any more understandable.

You have to think of your opponents as human (or the biorobot equivlent of human), regardless. If that stops you from executing your duty to your cause, then your cause wasn't worth killing for. Survival of humanity is certainly worth killing for, perhaps the ultimate reason to kill for, but it changes nothing morally when that isn't at stake.

[Cao Cao]

I don't consider their actions understandable. Regardless of what the Cylons had done, Gina and then Sharon were captured prisoners. Even nuclear destruction doesn't change the magnitude of their own actions nor make them any more understandable.

You have to think of your opponents as human (or the biorobot equivlent of human), regardless. If that stops you from executing your duty to your cause, then your cause wasn't worth killing for. Survival of humanity is certainly worth killing for, perhaps the ultimate reason to kill for, but it changes nothing morally when that isn't at stake.

Honestly you cannot expect people to react with that sort of objectivity to a member of a force that wants to wipe them out, totally.
The crew of the Pegasus not only felt desperate, but betrayed. Remember what Cain said, that Gina lived among them, sat with them at dinner, pretended she was one of them all the time aiding in the total destruction of their race.
To add to that - they're not human. They are biologically similar to humans but they aren't in so far as they're not members of human society, they are Cylons.

So physically, yes. They obviously can be raped. But from the crew of the Pegasus' point of view, they're making a machine who's an accessory to genocide suffer. It's not right, but it is understandable.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Think of it from the perspective of a crew that thought they were the only surviving humans left in the known universe. They've been caught with their pants down by frackin' machines that mimic their biology! They're bound to be pissed and being pissed is not known for being a good breeding ground for rational thoughts. They simply committed what they could of their own My Lai in space. Not everyone is a soldier equipped with chivalry and honour. It's readily apparent when Adama's crew have made contact with that of the Pegasus that they're out-of-their-minds.

[Junghalli]

A behavior can be deviant even when there's no actual physical person, such as--I don't know--child porn or something. A machine that cries, acts like a person in distress, and screams at the terror of being raped? Yeah, I'm pretty sure that you're not allowed to abuse something like that.

Um, I'd be wary of using the "if it reacts like a person" argument. You could probably build a totally non-intelligent "rape simulator" that convincingly acts like a rape victim but has all the self-awareness of a computer game - really is a computer game just more advanced. What exactly it says about the mental health of somebody who makes use of such a thing is a matter of opinion, but arguing that is rape is like arguing that shooting the bad guys in Splinter Cell is murder.

A much better criteria would be whether or not it demonstrates a generally high level sapience. When you get to that point IMO the "it's just a machine" argument looses all relevance. All intelligent beings deserve the same basic rights.

[Rye]

Humans are meat machines. Make your own conclusions.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Humans are meat machines. Make your own conclusions.

But what about the soul that makes us better than animals? It's not right to treat us as the same as toasters and animals!

[Stravo]

What about the argument that Adama posits early on in a 1st season episode that Cylons don't feel. They are software that pretends that it is feeling. Pretends that it is alive in essence. Are Cylons merely really good simulations of life or are they really sentient?

[Admiral Valdemar]

At what point does a simulation become real and vice versa? If you can define the arbitrary difference, I'd concede that point, but as it is, you may as well accept that we're wetware simulations and nothing more.

[Patrick Degan]

If it's gotten to the point where you really cannot tell the difference between real feelings/sentience and an alleged simulation of them, you've pretty much reached the point where there is no difference.

[Beowulf]

Turing test. If you can't tell the difference between the machine and a person, from interacting with them, there's really no difference.

[Keevan_Colton]

Turing test. If you can't tell the difference between the machine and a person, from interacting with them, there's really no difference.

Come on, about 1/3rd of people on the internet fail the Turing test.

[Surlethe]

Turing test. If you can't tell the difference between the machine and a person, from interacting with them, there's really no difference.

Bingo. If a Cylon can pass for a human -- i.e., can pass a Turing test -- there's no effective difference (with regard to personhood) between Cylons and humans. If there's no effective difference, then there's no reason to extend different moral values to the entity which can pass a Turing test.

[Covenant]

Turing test. If you can't tell the difference between the machine and a person, from interacting with them, there's really no difference.

And that's what I meant by my simulation example. If this machine tells you it can feel, that it thinks and has it's own emotions, and displays all the behavioral characteristics of a person... I think at that point if or if not it actually does have feelings in a human sense, that's mostly an academic debate.

I'm not sure about you possibly making the RapeBot-9000, what you could call that. Reprehensible, sure, but would it be illegal? I'm not sure it would be, any more than people going at it with some clothespins and whips would be 'illegal' in that sense. Pretty gross idea though.

[RedImperator]

What about the argument that Adama posits early on in a 1st season episode that Cylons don't feel. They are software that pretends that it is feeling. Pretends that it is alive in essence. Are Cylons merely really good simulations of life or are they really sentient?

The short answer is "Adama's wrong". That's the most I can tell you without spoiling an upcoming upisode for you.

[Rye]

What about the argument that Adama posits early on in a 1st season episode that Cylons don't feel. They are software that pretends that it is feeling. Pretends that it is alive in essence. Are Cylons merely really good simulations of life or are they really sentient?

The mind simulates things all the time, that's probably where we get most of our conscious experience from. There is no qualitative difference between a biological response that makes us go "ouch that is hot" or a triggered simulation to make a conscious entity react in the same way, sensory perception is involved in both, the pleasure and pain responses remain even if the method is slightly different.

If you had a robotic arm and it told you it was damaged with simulated pain that was indistinguishable from real pain, would it not be pain? If you gradually replaced your brain with cybernetic parts that performed the same functions and retained the same information, would you not still think and feel pain?

[CmdrWilkens]

First as a quick aside the Cylons are machines in that they must still be manufactured and do not reproduce through anything resembling human or animal reproduction. It could be cloning (which is the sole reason I didn't sya they do not reproduce by biological means) but it most certainly shows the anitithesis of being a race that descends normally from parent to offspring.

Anyway as to the morality of the actions we hold personhood as the level at which we grant rights (and certain lesser rights we assign to those with lesser status such as animals have the right to be free from cruel treatment but lack almost all basic human rights). We can definatively state that Cylons are not Humans so the question becomes where do they fall on the scale of personhood.

I would begin by saying that they are obviously indivualistic in their being. It is obvious that while they can communicate with one another non verbally each of the human-style models and even the Raider pilot models demonstrate unique character traits meaning they certainly have enough self awareness to be able to distinguish themselves one from another. Yet at the same time of the various human style replications there is a certain unity in that all of the Nuber Six models have a certain set of initial ideas which are formed during the life of that paticular consicious so to a degree their individuality is divided amongst the various models.

There is also clear indications of self aware thought in terms of the fact that they can plan and adapt and grow into new ideas. Whether "God" in the Cylon world turns out to be some overarching set of operating instructions central to their being or not they are capable of re-interpretation beyond the bounds of their initial ideas and intents which is highly indicative of a great capacity for human style free thought. This leaves us in a slightly tricky place, they are individually not human and something less than independently self aware yet they have the capacity to be so on a unit by unit and conscious by conscious basis, certianly the one Six unit's desire to die fully rather than suffer shows an extrmee degree of uniqueness that marks her as being as close to human as one could be while still not being a member of the species. So I would have to say that the Cylons certainly must be given most of your basic human rights and certainly the right to be secure in their own person from the attacks and degradations of others. The Six model that Pegasus captured was an enemy combatant which would be justification for killing her or for holding her captive for information but leaves no justification for any kind of mental or physical abuse and certainly not rape.

[His Divine Shadow]

Cylons are artificial organisms, advanced AI's that have displayed emotions, reason, self awareness and even faith in a higher being. They are however, machines in essence.

So are humans. Thats where it all falls apart.

[Coyote]

As mentioned, the Cylon was raped to bring about a particular mental reaction from her, ie, to break down her resistance through trauma. So regardless of what the rapists tell themselves to sleep at night, they did knowing inflict pain and suffering with the expectations of a desired result.

This does, however, bring up something else that might be curious.

Suppose a pervert commissions the construction of a child robot. Since the robot child does not develop in society and is programmed to be a willing participant, is it illegal for the pervert to have sex with the robokid? Or is it legal but immoral? Is the pedophile actually doing society a favor by finding essentially an advanced love doll to take out his perversions on, rather than preying on real kids?