Robots that have reached a certain degree of development indubitably have immortal souls; this is proven with the Spengler phenomenon, as well as the fact that there are robots in Valhalla. And we saw in The Revolution Will Be Televised that a human ghost can possess a non-human; I expect that it's a soul-to-soul thing, rather than a function of their meat.

My hypothesis is that sapient robots can be possessed, but they have to be intelligent enough that they could become free citizens by the standards of the Federation.

I call this the Church-Turing thesis.

So theoretically, the whole ordeal with the Turing folks could be simplified drastically with the assistance of a friendly spirit capable of possessing such a being - if the being is capable of being possessed, it is sentient; ergo, give 'em the stamp and send 'em on their way.

>So theoretically, the whole ordeal with the Turing folks could be
>simplified drastically with the assistance of a friendly spirit
>capable of possessing such a being - if the being is capable of being
>possessed, it is sentient; ergo, give 'em the stamp and send 'em on
>their way.

Eh, they'd still probably go through the whole rigmarole just because that's how you properly SCIENCE. But if that was a phenomena that was properly understood from a scientific standpoint, then yeah. That would become the big make-or-break part of the Turing Test.

LAST EDITED ON Sep-29-20 AT 01:12 AM (EDT)
 
>
>My hypothesis is that sapient robots can be possessed, but they
>have to be intelligent enough that they could become free citizens by
>the standards of the Federation.
>

One opposing position would logically be that the framework that technological sentients exist within may be incapable of supporting a biological sentient's spark, in the same way that it's impossible to run Holoshop For LINUX on a non-LINUX machine. There would be debate within this position on whether this is a universal constant, or if some sapient robots could be possessed, while others could not.

Peter Eng
--
Insert humorous comment here.

>>
>>My hypothesis is that sapient robots can be possessed, but they
>>have to be intelligent enough that they could become free citizens by
>>the standards of the Federation.
>>
>
>
>One opposing position would logically be that the framework that
>technological sentients exist within may be incapable of supporting a
>biological sentient's spark, in the same way that it's impossible to
>run Holoshop For LINUX on a non-LINUX machine. There would be debate
>within this position on whether this is a universal constant, or if
>some sapient robots could be possessed, while others could not.

Worse is the potential for some ghosts to be able to possess and animate otherwise inanimate objects. That creates an instant objection from the anti-synthetic life crowd that the Turing Institute is just using a poltergeist or something to fake their proof.

>>>
>>>My hypothesis is that sapient robots can be possessed, but they
>>>have to be intelligent enough that they could become free citizens by
>>>the standards of the Federation.
>>>
>>
>>
>>One opposing position would logically be that the framework that
>>technological sentients exist within may be incapable of supporting a
>>biological sentient's spark, in the same way that it's impossible to
>>run Holoshop For LINUX on a non-LINUX machine. There would be debate
>>within this position on whether this is a universal constant, or if
>>some sapient robots could be possessed, while others could not.
>
>Worse is the potential for some ghosts to be able to possess and
>animate otherwise inanimate objects. That creates an instant
>objection from the anti-synthetic life crowd that the Turing Institute
>is just using a poltergeist or something to fake their proof.

Ah yes. I believe "Poltergeist" is the correct term for such cases.

Now I feel bad that there's actual discussion because it was a convoluted pun.

Well yes, but the discussion is fun ;-)

What amazes me is you went all this way and nobody mentioned Starscream.