As I have studied artificial intelligence, and the perspectives of various contributors, I was surprised at the suggestion that computers could have rights. See Rights for the Toaster (October 2024). I have struggled with this. Would we grant (or recognize inalienable) rights for the toaster we built? Would it be different if it was a biological creature we created (think cloning and similar)?
An intriguing aspect of law is that humans can take different views and hold various opinions. What seems clear and unequivocal to one may remain debatable to another. I persistently remind my students that the "rule of law" is critical to a civil society. Without law, humans are left to the baser instinct of violence as a solution to disagreement.
A recent headline reminded me of a vast variance in perspective. Well beyond the debate of whether my toaster is sentient, the law has now recognized the personhood of a mountain. Most would likely either agree that granite is not sentient, or would harbor at least some skepticism of its personhood.
Nonetheless, the government in New Zealand has entered into a legislative compromise with the Māori people. That group holds a worldview that ascribes humanity, ancestry, or at least sentience to a very large rock (group of rocks or a conglomeration of rocks and the flora that co-exists there).
And, because the Māori people came to be in New Zealand before Europeans came, colonized, and conformed, there is some tendency to afford deference to their belief system. As a side note, it is possible that some other people inhabited that area before the Māori came. However, if that were fact, it was long ago. No peoples have stepped forward to express any oppression by the Māori. Does that mean there were none or that none survived?
Some might be willing to debate the most appropriate methodology for choosing foundational world perspective. Some might conclude, in the spirit expressed above, that “might makes right." Certainly, across the world, anecdotal support could be found for that contention among various peoples, continents, and islands. Some might perceive it as ongoing today in the Ukraine, Haiti, the Congo, and even Chicago.
Others might take a more deferential posture towards chronology. In other words, they might argue that those who were present first get to dictate the rules and beliefs. Or the first as far as we know? The noted challenge with that mindset may be the near possibility of determining who was “first," above.
In the end, the message is likely one of complacency or cooperation more than intellectual agreement. The relative logic or evidence regarding one worldview versus another is largely relegated to a modicum of compromise. Some believe that rocks are minerals, and others believe rocks are people, ancestors, or spirits. Who is to arbitrage right and wrong in such a debate?
At the end of the day, parties are perhaps willing to either stipulate to diametric inconsistency, in the interest of forgoing what is “right“ for what is expedient. If one of the parties to a dispute insists that they are a mountain, hours could be wasted arguing over the anatomical, scientific, and common sense arguments against that in a particular worldview. Or, the other dispute parties could merely accept the contention of mountainood, and move forward toward mutual agreement on other, critical, points of dispute.
Is there value in being right about mountainhood? Is there, in the topsy-turvy world we live in, a true “right“ or “wrong?“ Have we evolved so far from science that we collectively believe in mountainhood? Or, is ignoring such a contention, merely a means to an end? If there is perception here of some disrespect for mountainhood, that is unfortunate. This post could have been about a plethora of other beliefs and foundations that might struggle with science and our grasp of fact. However, mountainhood was in the news.
Is any dispute so different? If one of the parties to a workers' compensation dispute walks into mediation and introduces themselves as an alien from mars, or a mountain, should that be the main focus of the mediation? Or, might the mountainhood be overlooked and the focus directed at the pending issues and suggestions for resolution?
At the end of the day, "to-may-to" or "to-mah-to," the resolution is the resolution. Certainly, some will say "But what of the mental capacity issue?" That is fair. If I believe I am a mountain, well . . .. But, if that is my worldview, does it matter so much that mine is different from yours (you might believe I am a no mountain but perhaps a Quart?)? See Candor, Quarts, and Consistency (January 2025). Does it matter so much that we differ in perceptions or worldview?
The fact is that those differences challenge societies as they negotiate with each other. It is likely inevitable that parties in our smaller, personal disputes will struggle with it as well. And, perhaps the Māori people are right and the mountain is more than a bunch of rocks. Who am I to insist they are wrong?
