A gamer looks at Detroit: Becoming Human where, of course, you can choose what happens:
Detroit 2038. The city has transcended its current economic despair, emerging as the epicenter of an android revolution. Cyberlife, headquartered there, is the first company to engineer and produce fully autonomous, general purpose AI androids for consumers. They are bought and used
like laptops. Go to a Cyberlife store, purchase your new maid or nanny, and go home with it.The story centers around three of these androids; Markus, Kara, and Connor. In the first chapter, Markus lives with Carl Manfred, an elderly painter. Carl is kind and loving; he teaches him that not all humans are evil. But Carl dies of a heart attack in his studio and his son Leo (who had arrived to steal his father’s paintings for money) blames Markus. Two police officers promptly arrive and shoot Markus, shutting him down.
Markus wakes up at the bottom of a trash pit filled with the scraps and leftovers of countless androids. Somewhat like a phoenix rising from the ashes, he slowly repairs himself and makes his ascent to the top. He emerges changed; he is no longer just an android. For the rest of the story, he goes on to free countless other androids from their programming and give them free will (I’ll get to the blatant religious symbolism later)
. Adam Nieri, “A Closer Look at Detroit: Become Human, Part 1” at Mind Matters
Hey, if there’s another huge snowstorm out there…
See also: Does brain stimulation research challenge free will? (Michael Egnor)
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