Cloning isn't abhorrent. It's an interesting research (and in some cases, agricultural) technique that will expand human knowledge. Even if we limit it to "human cloning", human clones are called identical twins. You've started with a false premise.
Mary Anne Warren listed five criteria of person-hood if one were to meet some or all of these they should be considered a living entity and be granted rights. Consciousness Reasoning Self-motivated activity The capacity to communicate The presence of self-concepts and self-awareness, either in
sources:
Mary Anne Warren: On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion
Many animals clearly possess some degree of intelligence, but killing them would not constitute murder. Murder is not defined as the killing of an intelligent being.
Being "as abhorrent as cloning" (assuming for sake of the AI analogy that minds are copied too) turns out to be not so abhorrent at all. Copy me. Please. As many times as you can. I would like that very much. And I'm just a human, who unlike an AI wouldn't have telepathy with my copies.
Cloning is not abhorrent: Outside of current moral standards it is. Many things normal now were considered "abnormal" or "abhorrent" years ago. Copying an AI does not involv any risk at all and cloning itself is not a bad thing.
Just for funs: If an AI would philosophize, which statements would he follow: deterministic? nihilistic? positive? idealisme? Robotisme (as opposed against humanisme)? maybe even romantic? or would he not think of philosophies as usefull in anyway. and totally ignore them?
Murder is defined as "the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought". Even if a case could be made that AI *should* be considered a "person", they are not currently legally considered people anywhere in the world.
peanutgalaxy
