STAR TREK, SENTIENCE, AND HUMAN RIGHTS PRESENTED BY SIERRA MERRILL “THE MEASURE OF A MAN” KEY PLAYERS Captain Jean Luc Picard Commander William Riker Lieutenant Commander Data Commander Bruce Maddox Captain Phillipa Louvois TRIAL • Commander Maddox posits that Commander Data is property of Starfleet • Cannot resign • Must submit to testing • Deconstruction and re-assembly for replication • Captain Louvois determines that Data is property • The Retrial • Commander Riker as prosecution • Captain Picard as defense CONCLUSION • Data is a machine • Arm removed • Turned off • Is Data sentient? • What is sentience? • Intelligence • Self-awareness • Consciousness THE CONCLUSION • Intelligence • Proven • Data says, “I have an ultimate storage capacity of 800 quadrillion bits. My total linear computational speed has been rated at 60 trillion operations per second.” • Self-Awareness • Proven • Data says, “I am taking part in a legal hearing to determine my rights and my status. Am I a person or property?” (emphasis added). • Consciousness • Impossible to prove • Captain Louvois says, “Is Data a machine? Yes. Is he the property of Starfleet? No. We’ve been dancing around the question, Does Data have a soul? I don’t know that he has. I don’t know if I have. But I have got to give him the freedom to explore that question himself. It is the ruling of this court that Lieutenant Commander Data has the freedom to choose.” HUMAN RIGHTS Should the determination of rights be sentience? Undocumented Persons Persons with brain injuries or mental disorders Persons who are medically unresponsive UNDOCUMENTED INDIVIDUALS • Rights of undocumented individuals • The UN’s UDHR Article 15 reads, “(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality. (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.” • In the fiscal year of 2014, ICE had 315,943 removals. • 56% criminal removals • 95% non-criminal removals “involved recent border crossers, repeat immigration violators, or immigration court fugitives.” UNDOCUMENTED PERSONS • ACLU: • Approx. 41 million immigrants in the U.S. • In 2013, 83% deported persons were not given a hearing before a judge • The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights: • Immigrants contribute $10 billion per annum to U.S. economic growth • Many immigrants are treated unfairly; many are detained and deported without due process and with limited resources for recourse UNDOCUMENTED PERSONS • If Sentience… • Undocumented Persons have rights, as sentient human beings, to all the rights listed in the UDHR. • Due process • Equality • Freedom from “arbitrary arrest, detention, or exile.” • THEREFORE… • Any law or action that denies these persons such rights are in violation. BRAIN INJURIES AND MENTAL DISORDERS • Persistent Vegetative State • Severe cerebral damage • Chronic unconsciousness for 4+ weeks • “‘highly unlikely’ to live beyond vegetative state” • In absence of a court order or a DNR, “the hospital is obligated to keep the patient alive through artificial means until further notice.” BRAIN INJURIES AND MENTAL DISORDERS • Brain Death • “Irreversible loss of all functions of the brain” • Three main components: • Coma • Completely unresponsive and unconscious • Absence of Brainstem Reflexes • Lack of involuntary responses • Apnea Test • No self-regulated respiratory movements • Clinically and Legally Dead BRAIN INJURIES AND MENTAL DISORDERS • A person who cannot communicate, verbally or with gestures, forfeits the right to determine medical action unless a previous document has been written. • Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) • Refusal of Treatment • Advance Directives • Each person has an opportunity to form a living will that would give another person the right to speak for him/her. • Power of Attorney • Court order BRAIN INJURIES AND MENTAL DISORDERS • If Sentience… • Since the patients can no longer behave in a manner denoting sentience, their sentience is questioned • Therefore… • Rights and decisions go to next of kin, person with power of attorney, based on previous documentation, or are decided as best as possible by the doctor. BRAIN INJURIES AND MENTAL DISORDERS • Mentally impaired persons voting • Claudio López-Guerra • People deemed mentally impaired, and thereby unable to vote, in the current legislature should be given the vote “exclusively on the basis of non- instrumental or fairness considerations.” • Whoever is able to be in the franchise or be disenfranchised should have the right to vote BRAIN INJURIES AND MENTAL DISORDERS • Mental Illness and National Legal Rights in the U.S. • Americans with Disabilities Act • Many aren’t helped who have “overcome” parts of their disability BRAIN INJURIES AND MENTAL DISORDERS • If Sentience… • Their proof of sentience is perhaps most similar to Data in that their brains are often just different. • Individuals with mental disorders, as sentient beings, should have the same rights as other humans, such as the right to vote and be represented fairly in legal courts; they should also have the right to equal representation despite any similarities or differences between individuals with mental disorders and between individuals with and without mental disorders. CONCLUSION REFERENCE LIST • Maguire, W. B. (2011). The ‘Trials’ and Tribulations of • Department of Homeland Security (2014). FY 2014 Mentally Impaired Plaintiffs. Human Life Review, ICE Immigration Removals. Retrieved from 37(4), 65-79. http://www.ice.gov/removal-statistics#ft5. • López-Guerra, C. (2012). Enfranchising Minors and • American Civil Liberties Union (2015). Immigrants’ the Mentally Impaired. Social Theory and Practice, Rights. Retrieved from 38(1), 115-138. https://www.aclu.org/issues/immigrants- rights#act. • Goila, A. K. & Pawar, M. (2009). The diagnosis of brain death. Indian Journal of Critical Care • The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Medicine, 13(1), 7-11. doi: 10.4103/0972- Rights/The Leadership Conference Education Fund 5229.53108. (2015). Why You Should Care About Immigration. Retrieved from • United Nations (1948). The Universal Declaration of http://www.civilrights.org/immigration/care.html. Human Rights. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/history.sh • Pictures from stock and screenshots. tml..