Humanities' New Definition
Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? explores what it means to be human by looking at what it means to be an android. The big tell for androids; they can't empathize with each other, with humans or animals. To determine an andy from a human, there is the elaborate Voight Kampff test that measures empathetic response to a series of questions. Each question should elicit some kind of sympathetic response. If no dilation of the pupil or blush response, then you are dealing with an android.Seems pretty straight forward and since it's science fiction, we know it works (at least in the novel). As humans empathy cues us to feed a crying child while an anguished look tells us to help out a pained friend and requires communication -- we can read both smiles (pleasure) and suffering (pain). It's more than just putting yourself in another's shoes, it's caring about what happens to the person in your sneakers. At the University of Virginia, James Coan...