Although our discussion will be focused on White’s book, you should think of it also as an opportunity to think further about Blade Runner and the selections from Descartes, Locke, and Hume.
White identifies his core concerns at the beginning of his summary of ch. 6. These might broadened to the following questions:
• Are there (or could there be) non-human persons? Are there (or could there be) creatures whose individuality matters? (The latter question is intended to reflect the distinction between a “who” and a “what” that White suggests in his summary of ch. 1.)
• What does the answer to the first question imply about our ethical responsibilities to other creatures?
To put these issues in a still more open (but vaguer) way: what features of an animal or other creature might make it “special” in something like the way people are special, and what features make a creature deserve something like the sort of treatment we take people to deserve?
Although I am not asking you to submit questions in advance, you should come to class with questions and ideas about White’s summary in particular and about these issues more generally. (If you are interested in going beyond the summary of White’s book you can find further selections on the EQ course—i.e., not section—Moodle site and on the website for the book.)