A Philosophical Question: Should sentient/sapient robots/AI be granted rights?

[Rigel]

Yes, there's a lot of question threads, but I'd like this one to be a little more serious.

Previous questions & summarized community response: http://pastebin.com/mLrqyQxH


Our previous question was whether or not robots could give consent to loveual acts. Your responses seem to have mostly depended on whether or not said robot was sentient, sapient, or not. To try and bring a conclusion to that question, and to bring about more questions, I shall ask, "Should sentient/sapient robots/AI be granted rights?" Rights in this context would be akin to those human rights described by John Locke, and those rights that are bestowed by the government to its residents. Again, with the advances in technology, this may become a political issue in the future.

Question inspired by:

Against a sapient robot, assuming that they are given the same rights as a human legally (which is its own can of worms), it could probably be classified as rape.

[Ad Bot]

[Rednakin]

If the robot has sentience, I suppose it can. If it doesn't, then there's nothing to violate and consent is not needed.

[Refticus]

are you trying to forget a robot again rigel?

[Lord Tony®]

Robots are predetermined and pre-programmed, it's all in the programming.

[Tayasaurus]

No. Lack of sentience. Now hush before the tumblr people try to make it a gender

[e-maxx]

If it has actual reasoning and can comprehend what is happening then imo it can give consent

[blockguy™]

if you make a robot with a vagina i don't know what else you'd be expecting

[Frequency]

If it's a love robot, consent is implied.

Unless it's programmed for a specific person.

[Rigel]

Unless it's programmed for a specific person.

This is an interesting point. If a robot is programmed specifically to have love with one specific person, and to refuse all others, would it still be rape if another person had love with it?

[Frequency]

This is an interesting point. If a robot is programmed specifically to have love with one specific person, and to refuse all others, would it still be rape if another person had love with it?

That seems like a reasonable conclusion seeing as it's only programmed to consent to one person.

[Lord Tony®]

It also doesn't matter because it's not a real biological entity.

So who cares if it does or doesn't consent, just have love with it.

[Rigel]

That seems like a reasonable conclusion seeing as it's only programmed to consent to one person.

So how would a government carry out a rape charge against someone that "raped" a non-sapient robot? A sapient one? Would the charge be as bad as rape against another human being, or would it simply be classified as "Vandalism" or "Public Indecency"?

[Frequency]

So how would a government carry out a rape charge against someone that "raped" a non-sapient robot? A sapient one? Would the charge be as bad as rape against another human being, or would it simply be classified as "Vandalism" or "Public Indecency"?

Against a non-sapient robot, I imagine it wouldn't be able to be classified as a "person" and could be considered an act of vandalism.
Against a sapient robot, assuming that they are given the same rights as a human legally (which is its own can of worms), it could probably be classified as rape.

[gr8dayseth]

This is an interesting point. If a robot is programmed specifically to have love with one specific person, and to refuse all others, would it still be rape if another person had love with it?

what if it self-destructs when it's being loveed by the wrong person
sure the guy who made it has to rebuild it but that hooligan's reproductive organ will be no more and love robots everywhere can rest easy

[K3k0m@n]

obviously yes