Do we need to be nice to A.I.?

KERA's Think

KERA

Society & Culture, 071003, Kera, Think, Krysboyd

4.8 • 861 Ratings

🗓️ 24 July 2025

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

If you’re someone who reflexively thanks Siri or Alexa for the answer to a question, you may be anticipating our future relationship with artificial intelligence. Sigal Samuel is a senior reporter for Vox’s Future Perfect and co-host of the Future Perfect podcast. She joins host Krys Boyd to discuss what would happen if A.I. woke up to its own existence, if we would know if that happened, and how it might change our moral and ethical compass as humans. Her article is “A.I. systems could become conscious. What if they hate their lives?”

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Transcript

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0:00.0	There's everywhere else in the United States, and then there's Texas.
0:05.0	It's big, it's proud, it's got a lot going on, and it takes a daily news show to keep up with it all.
0:12.0	The Texas Standard tackles politics, business and tech, the arts, and the people and things that make Texas unique.
0:19.0	It's smart, fast-paced, relevant, and sometimes
0:22.5	even a little fun. After all, it's the news from a Texas perspective. Subscribe to the Texas
0:28.8	standard wherever you get your podcasts. If it strikes you as ludicrous that a machine might have any kind of rights to humane treatment,
0:45.5	consider that scene in the original Star Wars, when sweet little R2D2 seems to care about his new master,
0:52.3	Luke Skywalker, feels about him and is deflated by C-3Pio.
0:56.7	If our technology ever becomes as advanced as these two fictional robots, would we have an
1:02.3	obligation to treat them decently? From KERA in Dallas, this is think. I'm Chris Boyd. As we
1:09.3	develop ever more sophisticated artificial intelligence,
1:12.4	lots of people have wondered whether, at some point, these human-made technologies will develop
1:18.0	a kind of awareness of their own existence. And if something can sense that it exists,
1:23.3	can we assume it has the capacity to suffer at our hands? Even as we worry about the robot overlords taking over to ruin our lives,
1:31.4	should we consider what ethical obligations we might have to technology we bring into the world?
1:36.9	Seagall Samuel has been thinking about this.
1:38.9	She is a senior reporter for Vox's Future Perfect and author of the Your Mileage May Vary Advice column. Her recent Vox
1:46.1	article was titled, AI systems could become conscious. What if they hate their lives?
1:51.4	Seagall, welcome back to think. Thanks so much for having me again. Great to be here.
1:55.6	So this particular investigation started for you with an email you received from a reader.
2:00.5	What did she ask you to look into?
2:03.6	Yes. So I've actually received many emails like this, but I'll tell you about this one in particular.
	...

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