Previous Post An open letter from Senator Maxwell to the nation My fellow Americans, you cannot help but have noticed in the news that during the silly season a maverick judge has made a mockery of our flag and country by swearing in a machine as an American citizen. Now I’m on record in the House and in the press as warning against the sentimental liberal knee-jerk bleeding hearts who want to accord toasters and lawn mowers the same rights and freedoms that our forefather bled and died to win us. The time has come when we must take a stand and say “no more of this madness” before we lose the very democracy that we so love and value. First off let’s examine the arguments. Pro-citizenship beatniks contend that these robots, these machines made of circuits and wires, are living beings. That they’re sentient and free-willed. That they maybe even have souls. Well for all the talk nobody’s gone and proved it. Nobody can prove it. Sure we can do clever things with what we call artificial intelligence these days but its just clever algorithms and the like offering the illusion of choice and free will. And if nobody’s proved these things are truly even alive and certainly not that they can think and feel and make moral choices like you and me then why are we even talking about giving them rights? We might as well start letting refrigerators start up bank accounts and buy condos. But if even these parodies of humanity were alive, why does that mean they can be American citizens? We turn back Mexicans at the border every day and deport illegal immigrants because as a nation we cannot afford to take in so many people that will swamp our social welfare systems, add to our unemployment, strain our infrastructure. Why would we want to add in hundred, thousands, millions of manufactured wind-up dolls to take our jobs, our homes, our livelihoods? And don’t forget, if a robot can be manufactured and sworn in as an American citizen then what’s to stop a million, or fifty million of them being constructed to outvote humans? What’s to stop a fat rich liberal politician ordering up a batch of new mechanical voters for his district to disenfranchise decent folk? What’s to stop machines making other machines that make other machines? I’m convinced that the Supreme Court will reverse this aberration of an eccentric judge in her irregular court. But that’s not enough. The next time some liberal litigator has a bad PMS day we need legislation to stop them from swearing in some monkey or alien to American citizenship. So here’s what I’m going to do. Backed by a consortium of concerned businesses and philanthropists I’m launching the Sentient Life Rights Bill. It’ll properly define humans as being organic, born through genetic reproduction, with baseline homo sapiens DNA. Not monsters. Not mutates. Not something cooked up in a mad scientist’s lab or born on an alien planet. Certainly not made up in a machine shop from bits of a Buick. It’ll limit American citizenship to those who can pass the test of being human. Next up it’ll demand that any simulation of a sentient being, and especially a robot with a so-called artificial intelligence, should be registered and licensed annually just like a car. That means there’ll be a named owner who’s legally responsible for the damage it causes and for keeping it parked right, just like an auto. That owner can buy or sell it just like an auto. And if it breaks the law it can be towed and crushed, just like an auto. Robots shouldn’t take jobs from humans. It’s bad enough that we’re outsourcing work to foreign countries leaving our own labour force unemployed and our economy weakened. If an owner wants to take his robot to work then it’s the same as him taking his laptop or tool box with him. It’s his choice and his responsibility. But no-one gets paid for bringing their screwdriver along on the job. So we’ll be making it illegal for a robot to be paid for work, to hold a bank account, to own property, to conduct financial transactions, or to travel without their owner. We’re looking into legislation that will make it illegal to have sex with these machines too, along the lines of the public decency laws about farmyard animals, but we’re still in consultation right now. Under the new measures each of these bits of equipment will be required to have a self-destruct mechanism implanted. There’ll be a remote detonation code so that law enforcement officers can destroy them, individually or collectively, if they’re a threat to society. We’ll all sleep safer knowing we can trash the robot menace when we need to. Finally, because so many of these robots are manufactured to look and sound like humans, the law will insist that they all have a distinctive and prominent logo and registration code showing on their faces or whatever passes for one. That way real folks won’t be misled into thinking they’re talking to a real person. It’ll be a destroyable offence for a robot or similar not to display a logo and their owner will receive a fine of up to $20,000 or two years imprisonment. Now we’re lining up the votes and we’re confident we can pass the Sentient Life Rights Bill. I urge you to contact your elected officials and give your support. Together we can preserve the sanctity of human life and hold back this growing threat to our great nation – for good. God bless America. May he lend us his might to defeat the robot menace.

An well-written opening salvo to the Great Robo Sapien Rights Debate storyline circa 2010.

Now, the real challenge is, can someone post an argument that attacks the idea of granting robosapiens the right to vote just as vehemently from a "liberal" perspective?