What is it to be Human?

The 1982 science fiction classic film Blade Runner has several of the themes that have been discussed in class. The film is set in a dystopian future where people are engineered in factories to be stronger than regular humans. These engineered people (called replicants) are used for dangerous outer space mining. A group of replicants rebels against their human captors. It is decided that replicants need the be “retired” (killed) and it is up to the blade runners to carry this task out. The film raises the question what is it to be human? This relates to our Tectonic Precedent class where the question was raised what is authentic? While the replicants do not appear different from humans, they do have greater physical strength, and it is clear they have human emotions. The blade runner has to perform a test on people (similar to a lie detector test) to determine if someone is a replicant. This relates back to the question what is it to be human. If the replicants can not be differentiated from regular humans, are they not real humans? If you can not tell the difference between a copy and the original, how would you know which one is authentic or real?

Back to Blade Runner (SPOILER ALERT). At the end of the directors cut version of the film, the blade runner realizes that he himself is a replicant and now he must hide from the other blade runners. In Tectonic Precedent lecture we learned that modernism has very specific definitions; there is only one interpretation for one thing. Post modernism can have multiple interpretations for the same thing. This film seems to go beyond post modernism. It seems to say there is no difference between human or replicant, and it is not possible to tell the difference between the original and the copy.