My Thoughts on Artificial Intelligence

When it comes to debating whether artificial intelligence can be considered a person, I personally believe that in order to be considered a sentient thing, it must have self awareness. Once a thing has become self aware, it means that it has conscience. I believe that rights are reserved for living beings with consciousness and is able to view itself as its own person. They are able to feel develop their own identity to the point where society would agree that ending the life of such a being would be immoral. When something does not have self-awareness, it does not have an identity so it does not warrant as much importance as a human being.

If artificial intelligence advances to the point where it develops self-awareness, I would not be the side that would move the bar up. If artificial intelligence becomes self-aware, I will not move the goal posts and would actually concede. However, we learned in class that people will continue to move the bar up and I doubt that those people will concede like I would. I can definitely see most people of religious backgrounds arguing that the AI is still not conscious because it does not have a soul, unlike humans. As a person who is religious himself, I would agree with them that the AI would not have a soul, but I would still consider it immoral to not give them human rights. That being said, I'm not sure if we should advance AI to the point where it has a mind of its own, because they might become a thread to humankind if we do.