• Log In

The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

A Philosophy Podcast and Philosophy Blog

Subscribe on Android Spotify Google Podcasts audible patreon
  • Home
  • Podcast
    • PEL Network Episodes
    • Publicly Available PEL Episodes
    • Paywalled and Ad-Free Episodes
    • PEL Episodes by Topic
    • Nightcap
    • Philosophy vs. Improv
    • Pretty Much Pop
    • Nakedly Examined Music
    • (sub)Text
    • Phi Fic Podcast
    • Combat & Classics
    • Constellary Tales
  • Blog
  • About
    • PEL FAQ
    • Meet PEL
    • About Pretty Much Pop
    • Philosophy vs. Improv
    • Nakedly Examined Music
    • Meet Phi Fic
    • Listener Feedback
    • Links
  • Join
    • Become a Citizen
    • Join Our Mailing List
    • Log In
  • Donate
  • Store
    • Episodes
    • Swag
    • Everything Else
    • Cart
    • Checkout
    • My Account
  • Contact
  • Mailing List

Episode 175: Blade Runner: Androids and Humanity (Part One)

October 30, 2017 by Mark Linsenmayer 5 Comments

http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/traffic.libsyn.com/partiallyexaminedlife/PEL_ep_175pt1_10-17-17.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 46:10 — 42.3MB)

On Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1967) and the films Blade Runner 2049 (2017) and Blade Runner (1982).

What makes us human? Dick's novel about androids emphasized their lack of empathy, while the movie adaptations portrayed the "replicants" as plenty capable of emotion, but unjustly treated as servants or targets.

Attention: The second half of this special bonus episode is available only to supporters. You should go ahead and get the full, ad-free Citizen Edition. You can also hear it with a $1 or more pledge at patreon.com/partiallyexaminedlife.

All of these works are about a demonized "other" that is similar to humans but not granted "personhood." A bounty hunter ("blade runner," the term used for the movie, was actually taken from an unrelated book) kills these outlaws and is supposed to feel no remorse. But what if he's an android himself? What if he doesn't know he's an android? Or what if he's attracted to the android? What if he finds himself feeling empathy for androids? What if he is assigned to kill an android that looks just like the one he just had sex with? What if he's an android in love with a programmed hologram girl who has sex with another android that the hologram girl is (nearly) synchronizing her motions with? Dark humor and/or long, slow visual effect shots set to atmospheric music is what!

One of the more interesting features of the book is the religion, Mercerism, that involves a) status and ritual attached to taking care of an animal (which are hard to obtain, as most were wiped out in World War Terminus), and b) having a technologically induced multi-users-feeling-each-other online trip up a Christlike Sisyphus's mountain. Both of these things are supposed to embody this ethic of empathy, but they may be more like social control à la 1984 lite. Or maybe not: the ubiquitous TV host "Buster Friendly" who best conveys the spectacle ends up being an android who has it out for Mercerism. Mercer himself (the guy climbing the hill with whom the people bond in the ritual) is both a self-admitted phony and an authentic divine intervenor as he appears to two characters at key moments in the book.

As is often the case with thoughtful fiction, there's a tangled mass of themes thrown out there and not explored in any systematic philosophical way (in the book and the films), and you get the feeling that key philosophical questions are simply being written as answered according to how the author happens to devise the details of the situation. For example, there's no real reflection on the question of whether machines can actually think or self-reflect; they're simply given as fulfilling all the normal qualities of personhood apart from some emotional abnormalities. They're even made of biological material (so Searle should be OK with them thinking). So the question is just, are humans justified in treating them poorly, given that many of those humans themselves act without empathy, without appropriate affect, without truly authentic motivations or an independently achieved real appreciation of life? Clearly, the answer is "no," but luckily there are more interesting things going on in the book and films beyond this simple implication of the depicted conception of humanity.

Buy the book or try this online version. If you've never seen Blade Runner, watch the climactic scene featuring replicant Roy Batty's goofy monologue. Also, here are the excised monologues. Here's a clip from the new film.

Errata testifying to Mark's senility: I said I bought the Blade Runner DVD in 1991, but DVD players did not exist at the time. It was 2001.

End song: "Wounds and Nihilism (Quantum Androids)," written for this episode by Tyler Hislop (feat. Mark Lint). Listen to Tyler on Nakedly Examined Music #24.

Dick pic by Olle Halvars.

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmailby feather

Filed Under: Podcast Episodes Tagged With: affect, empathy, personhood, Philip K. Dick, philosophy and religion, philosophy podcast, science fiction and philosophy

Comments

  1. dmf says

    October 31, 2017 at 10:22 pm

    ah good timing, planning to see the new one this coming weekend.
    https://terenceblake.wordpress.com/2017/10/31/review-of-blade-runner-2049-on-the-ontology-of-replication/

    Reply
  2. Jennifer Tejada says

    November 1, 2017 at 2:22 pm

    Great episode!

    Just wanted to give a shout out to Tyler? – the person who collaborated on the song at the end. Loved it – and I’m pretty sure I heard you on another one not that long ago and also loved it.

    Reply
  3. Serena Schade says

    May 12, 2018 at 8:56 pm

    I second Jennifer on the music selection. This is the second time I’ve come across a musician inspired by this book:

    https://soundcloud.com/valis-mt/electric-sheep

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Philosophy of Humor (Philosophical Issues Related to the #thatasshole Campaign, Part 1) | The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast | A Philosophy Podcast and Blog says:
    October 31, 2017 at 10:02 am

    […] of insecurity, and hence a subdivision of incongruity. The bully derides an "other" just as in Blade Runner, where dissing those distressingly similar to humans helps biological humans feel secure despite […]

    Reply
  2. Empathetic – davidavien says:
    July 7, 2020 at 4:35 pm

    […] You can listen to Episode 175 by clicking here. […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

PEL Live Show 2023

Brothers K Live Show

Citizenship has its Benefits

Become a PEL Citizen
Become a PEL Citizen, and get access to all paywalled episodes, early and ad-free, including exclusive Part 2's for episodes starting September 2020; our after-show Nightcap, where the guys respond to listener email and chat more causally; a community of fellow learners, and more.

Rate and Review

Nightcap

Listen to Nightcap
On Nightcap, listen to the guys respond to listener email and chat more casually about their lives, the making of the show, current events and politics, and anything else that happens to come up.

Subscribe to Email Updates

Select list(s):

Check your inbox or spam folder to confirm your subscription.

Support PEL

Buy stuff through Amazon and send a few shekels our way at no extra cost to you.

Tweets by PartiallyExLife

Recent Comments

  • Larry Young on Ep. 310: Wittgenstein On World-Pictures (Part One)
  • Wes Alwan on PEL Nightcap April 2022
  • Wes Alwan on Ep. 305: Cormac McCarthy’s “Blood Meridian” (Part Three for Supporters)
  • Wes Alwan on Ep. 305: Cormac McCarthy’s “Blood Meridian” (Part Three for Supporters)
  • Wes Alwan on Ep. 306: Dworkin and the Dobbs Decision (Part Three for Supporters)

About The Partially Examined Life

The Partially Examined Life is a philosophy podcast by some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it. Each episode, we pick a text and chat about it with some balance between insight and flippancy. You don’t have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text we’re talking about to (mostly) follow and (hopefully) enjoy the discussion

Become a PEL Citizen!

As a PEL Citizen, you’ll have access to a private social community of philosophers, thinkers, and other partial examiners where you can join or initiate discussion groups dedicated to particular readings, participate in lively forums, arrange online meet-ups for impromptu seminars, and more. PEL Citizens also have free access to podcast transcripts, guided readings, episode guides, PEL music, and other citizen-exclusive material. Click here to join.

Blog Post Categories

  • (sub)Text
  • Aftershow
  • Announcements
  • Audiobook
  • Book Excerpts
  • Citizen Content
  • Citizen Document
  • Citizen News
  • Close Reading
  • Combat and Classics
  • Constellary Tales
  • Exclude from Newsletter
  • Featured Ad-Free
  • Featured Article
  • General Announcements
  • Interview
  • Letter to the Editor
  • Misc. Philosophical Musings
  • Nakedly Examined Music Podcast
  • Nakedly Self-Examined Music
  • NEM Bonus
  • Not School Recording
  • Not School Report
  • Other (i.e. Lesser) Podcasts
  • PEL Music
  • PEL Nightcap
  • PEL's Notes
  • Personal Philosophies
  • Phi Fic Podcast
  • Philosophy vs. Improv
  • Podcast Episode (Citizen)
  • Podcast Episodes
  • Pretty Much Pop
  • Reviewage
  • Song Self-Exam
  • Supporter Exclusive
  • Things to Watch
  • Vintage Episode (Citizen)
  • Web Detritus

Follow:

Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | Apple Podcasts

Copyright © 2009 - 2023 · The Partially Examined Life, LLC. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy · Terms of Use · Copyright Policy

Copyright © 2023 · Magazine Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in