X-Message-Number: 21307
Date: Fri, 28 Feb 2003 11:40:38 +0100
From: Henri Kluytmans <>
Subject: Does information have rights ?

I have to add a little to what I said yesterday.

I wrote :

>definition of rights is a better one, because it's irrational 
>to give passive objects or information any rights.

Of course things get more complicated when talking about complex 
active objects. What I mean here, is when an object gets complex 
enough to develop some kind of self-consciousness.

For example, for a present-day computer there is no complication 
yet. But what about a possible future computer that is fast enough 
and runs software that demonstrates self-consciousness ...

Or some biological examples :

A plant can be owned, and they have no rights.

A dog can be owned, but we have given them limited rights.

What about a gorilla or chimpansee?

What about a human baby?

Or even better, what about a human embryo ?

====

IMO the level of self-consciousness should determine the rights 
an "object" should have. (As current societies today seem to do for 
most biological organisms.) Of course the problem here, is how to 
determine this level...

Now I have to elaborate a little on why I put the word "object" 
between quotes :

At an abstract level, I think rights should not be attached to 
the physical objects, but to the possible information processes 
that run in these objects. Currently this is not an issue yet, 
because at the moment the only information processes that demonstrate 
a "high" level self-consciousness are running in biological organisms 
and their are no means yet to extract them from their biological 
substrate.

(Possibly I will get some objections to the central assumption 
that was used in this last paragraph.  :-)


Cheers,
>Hkl

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