Soulcreator
While I understand and respect your viewpoint, I’m not quite sure you understand what I’m saying here… The question is designed to be a no win scenario, it’s phrased in such a vague way that no matter how you answer someone else can chime in and say oh no, your not imagining the terrible scenario I’m imagining. There’s literally no way of answering it in a way that someone is going to chime in and tell your wrong.
It’s literally designed to be a test designed to gauge your reaction more than it is to be answered seriously.
Without more info one can’t possibly respond in a legitimate manner. And any responses without additional information is more of a mirror to your own personal disposition and fears than it is a legitimate response to the question.
One of the big issues I see with that proposal is that at some point, due to inflation an annual income in the ball park of 5 million dollars a year will be considered ‘middle class’. And then the average person will be hit with substantial taxes from a then archaic tax law.
At that point you’ll need a constitutional amendment to shift the goal post which is nearly impossible to do such. (At least at this moment in time it is.)
At that point the budget would likely have finally balanced itself out due to the higher tax rates. So of course there will probably be politicians arguing against making this change as it will effectively kill the federal budget, because shifting the tax laws will mean the government will be taking in substantially less.
It’s a super well intentioned idea at the moment but it’s really a disaster in the making for a future generation.
To me it makes sense, there are a ton of ethical ramifications to the EMH being sentient that the people of the federation would likely have a very hard time coming to grips with.
Data is a novel one of a kind technology for which the vast majority of people have never seen or interacted with. It’s easy to classify him in one way or another as it doesn’t effect their life in the big scheme of things.
EMH on the other hand is just a standard hologram, not one created via extenuating circumstances. Meaning the people of the federation would effectively be creating and destroying lifeforms for their own pleasure every time they use the holodeck. I think the modern day equivalent would be to say that every time you turn off your TV or change the channel someone has to die. Or better yet imagine if every time you killed an opponent I’m a video game a sentient life form would have to die.
Possibly a better modern analogue would be the meat and dairy industry. People in modern times commonly accept that dogs are sentient unique individuals with their own personalities, likes, wants and a possibly even a soul. But cows are mindless automatons where it’s okay to use them for our pleasure. They aren’t ‘real’ to people the way dogs and cats are. Most people don’t want to consider the ethical ramifications of every meal they eat especially when they’ve been doing things one way for the majority of their life.
If EMH is sentient does that mean they have to stop the use of the holodeck all together? Do they have to “dumb down” the processing of holodeck characters to prevent it from accidentally creating a sentient life? And what would be the ethical implications of all of your holodeck adventures? If you have sex with someone on a holodeck adventure is that considered rape or sexual assault? What is consent if your programmed to feel a certain way from inception.
These are heavy issues for the average federation grunt to have to ponder every time they want to blow off some steam. OR they can just put EMH in the same bucket as every other holodeck character who thinks they are alive but in reality are probably just a few lines of code sitting on the computers storage.
That may be true and all but I take it you didn’t read the article, because that not what it was about.
They polled people and those who are regularly vote in past elections tend to be pro Biden, those whom hadn’t voted in recent elections tended to be pro Trump.
Which is ironic because if everyone just got out and voted we might just have a send Trump presidency on our hands. I could be wrong, but I suspect that’s the opposite of what you are thinking would happen.
Why do we always assume the ones who don’t vote aren’t going to vote to run us off the cliff?
My frustration with the get out and vote push is that there is always this weird assumption that the ones who aren’t voting are some how going to magically push things into the “right” direction. What if we are all better off if they don’t vote?
Thank you for being a voice of reason here. I’ve never understood this argument, yes the same word can refer to two different things and both sides can simultaneously be right (and wrong) about the usage of the word.
It’s like no one has ever met two people who share the same name, most reasonable people don’t argue with random people “You can’t be Joe! My friend is named Joe and you aren’t him!”.
And to compound the fact I’ve noticed that people’s native languages and place of birth tend to determine where they fall on the argument. You guys realize that words can sound and be spelled similar and mean something different things in different languages and cultures, right?