Life22

Day 13,949 - Sentience… Where do we draw the line.mp3
Transcript
00:00:03 Kevin
Hey gang, Kevin here, Life 22.
00:00:05 Kevin
Oh yeah, 'cause you wanna see my face, right?
00:00:08 Kevin
So, I don't know.
00:00:12 Kevin
You ever just start driving, driving in your car?
00:00:16 Kevin
Now I know we've already done one of those podcasts.
00:00:18 Kevin
But have you ever just done one, like you're just driving and you're just like, these thoughts pop in your head or you get out of the shower and these thoughts pop in your head and you're like,
00:00:28 Kevin
What is sentience?
00:00:30 Kevin
And you just wonder, like, at what point-- and I know we're humans, right?
00:00:35 Kevin
So we try to put definitions on everything.
00:00:37 Kevin
We try to put it-- square is a square, and a rectangle is a bigger category of square.
00:00:42 Kevin
And it's one of those-- we're one of the few creatures that see the symmetry in nature, but there's actually no actual rhyme or reason to the symmetry in nature, but we try to find it.
00:00:57 Kevin
Yeah, so, I don't know.
00:00:59 Kevin
I was thinking about sentience the other day and how like, you know, a group of bacteria comes together to essentially like make your cells and use your DNA as a giant building, at which point like the building eventually has sentience when it's trying to survive and live on its own and be you, right?
00:01:18 Kevin
And then, but at which point do you get together with a group of other humans?
00:01:24 Kevin
And that group mentality becomes its own sentience, right?
00:01:27 Kevin
It's one thing to say like, okay, this person, that person, this person.
00:01:30 Kevin
So if you watch, I don't know, Star Trek Next Generation, and you're like, all right, I know what Borg is, right?
00:01:36 Kevin
Like it's the collective, right?
00:01:38 Kevin
So at which point does the collective actually become its own sentience?
00:01:45 Kevin
And I know that's just a human construct, right?
00:01:47 Kevin
The design, the line that we're gonna draw
00:01:52 Kevin
that is human sentience, right?
00:01:54 Kevin
Like, or not human sentience, but sentient, right?
00:01:58 Kevin
I don't know.
00:01:58 Kevin
Makes you wonder.
00:01:59 Kevin
You start thinking about it.
00:02:00 Kevin
At which point does a group of people that mob mentality, right?
00:02:03 Kevin
Like, well, they call it mob mentality, but like, at which point is it its own sentience?
00:02:09 Kevin
Like, at which point does the mob actually, you know,
00:02:14 Kevin
act as one, right?
00:02:15 Kevin
Like, and I'm sure we haven't experienced it to the degree that it is its own operating cog, like you would see in the example of Borg, right, where you actually have to pull off one piece and keep it and isolate it and keep it on its own for a while in order for it to realize that it is its own separate sentience that makes up one piece of the puzzle.
00:02:36 Kevin
So, just something to think about on a Saturday morning.
00:02:39 Kevin
Thanks, guys.
00:02:39 Kevin
We'll see you next time.