Cloning?

[Chad32]

Does sentience have to do with biology? I don't actually know exactly what sentience is. Why we have it, and nothing else. Or if some animals do have it, to what level do they have it?

[anijen21]

Does sentience have to do with biology? I don't actually know exactly what sentience is. Why we have it, and nothing else. Or if some animals do have it, to what level do they have it?

I hate to sound like a know-it-all here but I think this can start an interesting discussion.

Sentience, in the truest sense of the word, is the ability to experience the world. To feel, taste, see, smell, hear, whatever. So, technically, Applegate was using it wrong. Most animals, or at least anything the Animorphs could acquire, are "sentient." The word she was looking for was "sapient"--that is, wise, or aware, or intelligent, or whatever arbitrary line you want to draw that makes something "worthy" of...whatever.

This arbitrary line is what a lot of speculative fiction, including Animorphs, focuses on. At what point is killing something murder? At what point do "human" rights come into play? How can we judge creatures who may be intelligent, but we can't communicate with? The questions you asked are exactly what everyone asks. And the question at hand, whether "sentience" or "sapience" is biological or something else, is along the same lines. I always thought the premise of Animorphs had a lot of room for this kind of stuff, and she covered a lot of it. Cassie throwing a moralistic hissy fit every time they were faced with the task of acquiring something even slightly intelligent. Battling for control of the animal mind/instincts being similar between Yeerks and morphing.

So anyway, the answer to your question is no one knows. That's why it makes such damn good sci-fi.

[EmberGryphon]

Currently, as far as I know, the arbitrary line we draw at where something is 'sentient' (or 'sapient') is self-awareness- that is, awareness that you are you, that you exist, and the ability to motivate yourself through concious decisions as opposed to blindly obeying instinct. ^_^

The current biological "test" to determine an animal's self-awareness is by putting an animal in front of a mirror. If their actions are coming from concious decisions to move a part of their body as opposed to instinctive reactions to their environment, then when they move their front leg, the animal in the mirror will move its front leg simultaneously. They will recognize the animal in the mirror as a reflection of themselves. Whether or not they have recognized their reflection is determined by marking the animal with paint in an area they cannot see independently- if they see the paint on the reflection and realize that the mark is actually on them, they have passed the test.
Currently, the animals I know of that have passed this test are humans, dolphins, elephants, chimpanzees, and magpies. I believe there are others, though.
Personally, I find the fact that magpies are self-aware to be awesome.
That is all. =3

[ThinkAgain]

I believe that that mirror test may not be entirely accurate.

It just denotes that the species is able to denote connections, and make realizations. It just indicates a higher level of intelligence, not necessarily self-awareness.

I read about a dog that was able to use process of elimination to determine the meaning of a new command. There would be several toys, such as a ball, a stuffed bear, etc. If the dog was told to get the ball, it would. If you laid out various objects, it would pick it out. If you presented various objects to the dog that it recognized, and one it did not, then told it to retrieve it, it would realize that it had not heard that word before, and would match it up to the object it has not seen before.

It was thought that process of elimination was reserved for sapient beings. Dogs are not even the same league as other questionable animals, such as dolphins or greater apes.

So, is there any true way to determine is something is truly self aware? I think something may be the ability to foresee and fear death. Not death in the sense of not living; dying to a predator, but rather in the sense we do. Wanting to live because of nothing beyond simple desire, as well as the capacity to wonder what happens after death.

[anijen21]

I like the way this post is going.

I think Aristotle's "line" was judgment--that is, humans stand out above all other animals because we can assign a moral valence or charge to all of our actions. We know murder is wrong, we know charity and love are good, and we have the power and ability to judge and condemn those who do "bad," and praise and adulate those who do "good."

But does an organism need social structure in order to be "sapient?" What if there was a human who was born in a white room with no reference to anything? As it grew, would that human no longer be sapient because it has no point of reference?

idk philosophy is fun until it's depressing

[ThinkAgain]

If a human is raised in complete isolation and ignorance, it will not be 'human' in that sense of the word.

The human mind can only develop certain skills and abilities at certain points, and then it will never be able to learn. If language is not learned by a certain point in life, the human in question will never be able to have the capacity to understand language.

However, due to the rarity of finding such children, as well as them lacking the capacity to communicate, it is impossible to determine if they have the capacity to develop and understand morals, or if they know what death is, and what they think of it.

However, the mind retains its impressionability. There was on instance in eastern Europe (I cannot recall where specifically) where are mother threw an unwanted child into a dog kennel. The child survived, but was luckily found before she was unable to learn communication. She can speak, but very poorly. Either way, she acted as dogs did, she 'barked' at threats, sniffed other dogs, slept with them, like them, howled, and otherwise acted like a dog would. It took an incredibly long time to break her of this, and even then she occasionally relapses.

If you took a cat, and raised it with and as dogs, would the same thing happen? What about a monkey?

There are so many levels to determining sapience it is impossible to determine.

[anijen21]

If a human is raised in complete isolation and ignorance, it will not be 'human' in that sense of the word.

I think we just invalidated all of Cassie's angst about morphing into a sentient (or sapient, whatever word we're using) organism. The morph would have no point of reference, no social conditioning, no "life," right? So morph whatever the hell you want, basically.

Let's say a Yeerk, on the other hand, had the ability to breed or create life with a similar lack of social structure. Like what if a Yeerk infested a newborn baby? At this point in its development, it's not "sapient," so is it technically wrong? And could an organism capable of sapience and free will develop those things if it is never under its own control? I guess the Yeerk has to feed every three days, so it would have some degree of it, but...wait, I think I read about this on wikipedia one day, but I can't remember what the article is. It basically outlined four structures, I think dependent both on concepts of "free will" and "destiny." Like, is the entirety of existence preplanned, a series of forces set in motion since the Big Bang, or does free will actually play a part? I can't remember. I'm rambling now so I'll stop.

DETERMINISM IT'S CALLED DETERMINISM there now I feel better

[Chad32]

If a human is raised in complete isolation and ignorance, it will not be 'human' in that sense of the word.

I think we just invalidated all of Cassie's angst about morphing into a sentient (or sapient, whatever word we're using) organism. The morph would have no point of reference, no social conditioning, no "life," right? So morph whatever the hell you want, basically.

Yes. The only problem I would have about morphing a person, like a Human, is if you do something that would give that person a bad name, or whatever. Like use his/her body to steal stuff. Which the Animorphs would never purposefully do.

But KA was trying to get her message across about identity, and how important it is. Not that I agree with things, like labeling all voluntaries as weak scum, or that Ax becoming a kind of controller in the end was darkly appropriate. Shoot, all he ever did was act like a soldier, and a soldier is supposed to follow the squad leader. Or do you think a lot of voting actually does go on in the military?

[Galladerotom]

 

All of you.

Anyways clonning an Andalite would take too long for one thing plus aging defects since Alloran was pretty old. Also the Yeerk Vissers are alot like warlords in competition with eachother for land, hosts, prestige the Visser wanted to keep Alloran for himself. I think the yeerks could have worked out some of the problems after a lot of reasearch and protype tests. However Visser three was mainly interested in the power to morph and an andalite without that power would be usless.

In short it would take too long, it would take too much work and the out come would not be as great. As for Hork-Bajir they have shorter lifespans and reproduced quickly enough for the Yeerks.

[senter.pat]

O thats not true though, the visser didnt care about morphing, he wanted the andalite host because of its eyes.

[AniDragon]

Actually, he wanted a host in general because of it's eyes. He wanted an Andalite host because of what it would represent. He wanted to be the ultimate enemy to Andalites, and what better way to do that than to take over one?