"Robert J. Chassell" wrote:
> Some science fiction readers ask whether a sapient artificial
> intelligence, with the intelligence, the emotions, and the wisdom of a
> human, but not his looks, are out because they are not built in God's
> image, or whether they are in. (I once had a long discussion with an
> Iranian on just this question; when I returned to the US, I mentioned
> the discussion to a friend. He wondered whether among Christians such
> as himself any entity that did not appear overtly as God's image could
> be considered `in'.)
>
> Daniel Defoe satirized this kind of distinction making by describing a
> war between those who broke the pointed end of an egg and those broke
> the more gently rounded end. Everyone agrees that major decisions
> should not be based on the choice of which end of an egg to break.
I believe that Dr. Seuss's _The Butter Battle Book_ does something
similar, in that there is a war between those who hold their bread
butter side up and those who hold their bread butter side down. Had
quite an arms race going there in that book.
Julia
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