# Are the replicants in Blade Runner actually human? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 26, 2011, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403 "2011-12-26T05:56:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 7:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/41 "2013-01-04T07:13:15Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Tyrell had some replicant in him, mostly in his eyes. [Mini Me]Do you have a little clone in you? Would you like to?[/mini me] ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 7:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/42 "2013-01-04T07:25:36Z")
Looked at closely enough, could any of us really pass a Turing test? If we did, would we really be human? I think we are over-thinking the movie. Everyone in it is human, even if they are artificial in whole or in part. But nobody is perfect. Being perfect would exclude one from being human. Creating flawed creatures to exploit them is wrong. So is exploiting any creature. Tyrell deliberately created humans to enslave them and made them flawed. This in itself was human hubris. He was no more or less human than his creations. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Q](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/898d66/32.png) [@Johnny\_Q](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Q)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/43 "2013-01-04T10:00:02Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > Would you step into a transporter, be broken down into your molecular makeup and destroyed in the process, recreated on Mars by a machine with the exact information? > > Would that be _you_? Not willingly. It would only be me if the consciousness(for lack of a better word) from this body made the trip. If my consciousness is destroyed with the rest of my body I’m dead. If I don’t physically(again for lack of a better word) wake up in the destination, the reconstructed body, no matter how much it resembles my body or my personality, is somebody else. If I’m not there, it’s not me. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/44 "2013-01-04T16:25:35Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > There are humans with only human DNA who are insensitive to pain. This recent [New York Times piece on the subject](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/18/magazine/ashlyn-blocker-feels-no-pain.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0) actually opens with a story about a girl reaching into a pot of boiling water. > > Seems like it would be pretty easy for a replicant to feign pain in this situation, provided they can sense changes in temperature. They apparently cannot bluff their way through the VK test, though. Even Rachel was identified as a replicant through the VK test, it just took longer than usual. I am not talking about the _pain_, how do you fake the scalding and blister? Note that the girl in your article was still burned, she just didn’t feel the pain. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/45 "2013-01-04T16:55:38Z")
> [@astro](#): > > It dates the movie somewhat re the notion that you can’t tell the replicant from a human being when a simply DNA profile would deduce it immediately if you have the replicants genomes on file, which they certainly should. The movie Bladerunner was released in 1982 which is based a [book published in 1968.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_Androids_Dream_of_Electric_Sheep%3F). > > Genetic ID testing took off with the advent of [PCR analysis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymerase_chain_reaction)which debuted in 1983. > > The movie was so elegantly done sometimes we forget the science in the movie is 30-50 years old. Trying to parse out whether the replicants were physcially “real” humans or not is going to be an exercise in frustration. In the book, Deckard gets a bounty for each kill. But to confirm it, they have to test the bone marrow of the ‘replicant’. Also Deckard is saving money so he can buy an electric sheep. The religion in the book tells everyone they should have a pet but animals are very scarce. So there are electric animals, with gears and such but most people can’t tell the difference. His neighbor has a horse, which lives in a pen on the roof of the apt building. Deckard doesn’t realize it is not a real horse. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/46 "2013-01-04T17:42:47Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > Rachel actually blew the question about the photo of a nude woman on a bearskin rug. The woman in the photo is a red herring, Rachel should have been horrified by the _rug_. You are mistaken, there is no mention of a bearskin rug, you must have subconsciously filled that in. And since there are lots of manufactured animals in the movie, it might not really matter, what if it was from an artificial bear? You might be more inclined to think she blew the question about killing the wasp on her arm. Except, these were among the first few questions, Deckard said it took over a hundred. And really, he was not really looking for answers, he was looking for autonomic responses. Correct answers can easily be trained for. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/47 "2013-01-04T18:56:02Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Right. Any creature that can stick his hand into boiling water like that has to have different DNA. > > Which asks the question: why not just test the replicants with a drop of boiling water? High heat resistance might not be a standard feature on all replicants. Note that Roy doesn’t stick his hand in the water - he has Leon do it for him. Leon was a heavy labor model, who was used in dangerous working conditions. The other replicants probably don’t have this modification. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/48 "2013-01-04T19:14:37Z")
I don’t think being resistant to burns is a feature of each and every replicant. Of course, Pris is a “standard pleasure model”, and she can reach into boiling water. But even if the cops can’t use “not resistant to burns” as an indication that the subject is a human, they could use “resistant to burns” as an indication that the subject is a replicant. Anyway, it’s a minor plot discrepancy. It makes more sense thematically for the VK test to test emotional response. If they have a DNA sequencer then it isn’t as interesting. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/49 "2013-01-04T19:59:01Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I am not talking about the _pain_, how do you fake the scalding and blister? Note that the girl in your article was still burned, she just didn’t feel the pain. I think there would be ethical problems with subjecting humans to a test where they would have to be physically harmed to prove that they’re not replicants, and I don’t know that the physical response to such an injury would be consistent enough among humans to make a reliable test. > [@Lemur866](#): > > I don’t think being resistant to burns is a feature of each and every replicant. Of course, Pris is a “standard pleasure model”, and she can reach into boiling water. FWIW I have seen some fan speculation that Pris and Zhora were mixed up by the police, and that Zhora was actually the pleasure model and Pris was the one with superhuman strength and endurance. > [@For You](#): > > You are mistaken, there is no mention of a bearskin rug, you must have subconsciously filled that in. You’re right, I just checked YouTube and it’s not in the [movie](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-DkoGvcEBw), but it is in the [book](http://books.google.com/books?id=jUX8N9kiCiQC&lpg=PA49&dq=Do%20Androids%20Dream%20Of%20Electric%20Sheep%3F%20bearskin&pg=PA49#v=onepage&q=Do%20Androids%20Dream%20Of%20Electric%20Sheep?%20bearskin&f=false). It’s made explicit in the book that Rachel’s failure to react to the bearskin rug is what makes Deckard begin to think of her as a replicant. He was already suspicious and he’s not totally certain even after the bearskin rug question, but this is the first question where he thinks “An android response.” > [@](#): > > And since there are lots of manufactured animals in the movie, it might not really matter, what if it was from an artificial bear? As I mentioned before, the cultural significance of animals is largely dropped from the movie, but in the book the possibility of an artificial bear presumably wouldn’t have made a lot of difference in a human’s emotional response to the question. Killing an animal would be as offensive to them as killing a baby, maybe even worse. A human probably would not have thought “Well, maybe it’s not a _real_ bearskin”, and even if they did the notion of decorating with synthetic animal pelts would be about as grotesque as decorating with synthetic baby corpses. Another VK question included in the book involves a room decorated with bullfighting posters, and this is supposed to upset a human even though they’re just illustrations and bullfighting hasn’t existed for many years. > [@](#): > > You might be more inclined to think she blew the question about killing the wasp on her arm. Except, these were among the first few questions, Deckard said it took over a hundred. And really, he was not really looking for answers, he was looking for autonomic responses. Correct answers can easily be trained for. The look Deckard gives her after the wasp question in the movie suggests to me that he’s surprised or offended by her answer, but there’s variation in the level of empathy among humans and one missed question apparently isn’t enough to prove someone’s a replicant. In the book there’s a hierarchy of animals with some being more valuable than others, and the correct response to the banquet-of-oysters-and-dog question is apparently supposed to be that both are offensive but eating a dog is worse. So it may be that killing a wasp is considered bad, but not _inhumanly_ bad. As for training for the correct answers, this could only be done if replicants knew what the correct answers were supposed to be. Replicants may know enough about humans to correctly guess what they’re supposed to say in response to \*most \*of the questions and Deckard is thus primarily interested in measuring their emotional response, but if someone gives the wrong verbal answer then of course Deckard is going to notice that too. ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/50 "2013-01-04T20:27:07Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > If they are basically human in a biological sense, I wonder if Scott screwed up when he had Pris flop around like a dying fish after Deckard shot her for the first time, which might seem to indicate that they have machine parts (or at least machine programming). I’ve always thought she was throwing a tantrum. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/51 "2013-01-04T20:31:58Z")
> [@Mollie\_Magill](#): > > I’ve always thought she was throwing a tantrum. I assumed the replicants had enlarged adrenal glands and the like which under stress would release ridiculous amounts of hormones, causing the squashed bug like reaction to someone fatally injured. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/52 "2013-01-04T22:23:29Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > … not in the [movie](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-DkoGvcEBw), but it is in the [book](http://books.google.com/books?id=jUX8N9kiCiQC&lpg=PA49&dq=Do%20Androids%20Dream%20Of%20Electric%20Sheep%3F%20bearskin&pg=PA49#v=onepage&q=Do%20Androids%20Dream%20Of%20Electric%20Sheep?%20bearskin&f=false)… Which I think is a tenuous point. There really are more differences between the book and the movie than there are similarities. One really has to discuss one or the other, not try to force them into a unified story. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/53 "2013-01-04T22:59:49Z")
> [@For You](#): > > Which I think is a tenuous point. There really are more differences between the book and the movie than there are similarities. One really has to discuss one or the other, not try to force them into a unified story. I made it clear in my first post in this thread (written more than a year ago) that I was going to talk about the book as well as the movie. The VK test as presented in the movie doesn’t make a lot of sense, so I thought some Dopers might be interested in the greater context provided by the book. If you have a problem with that then you are welcome to ignore my posts. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2013, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/54 "2013-01-05T15:50:08Z")
OH, these are zombie replicants. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2013, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/55 "2013-01-05T16:40:12Z")
> [@Johnny\_Q](#): > > Not willingly. > > It would only be me if the consciousness(for lack of a better word) from this body made the trip. If my consciousness is destroyed with the rest of my body I’m dead. If I don’t physically(again for lack of a better word) wake up in the destination, the reconstructed body, no matter how much it resembles my body or my personality, is somebody else. > > If I’m not there, it’s not me. This reminded me of a Dawkins quote: > [@](#): > > “Think of an experience from your childhood. Something you remember clearly, something you can see, feel, maybe even smell, as if you were really there. After all you really were there at the time, weren’t you? > > How else could you remember it? But here is the bombshell: you weren’t there. Not a single atom that is in your body today was there when that event took place … > > Matter flows from place to place and momentarily comes together to be you. Whatever you are, therefore, you are not the stuff of which you are made. If that does not make the hair stand up on the back of your neck, read it again until it does, because it is important.” Regarding the movie, I do remember seeing storyboards showing an early version of the opening of the movie, after a replicant is shot its jaw is removed by the Blade Runner and it clearly had a serial number or trade mark in the bone. Ridley Scott reported that that scene is very likely to show in the new Blade Runner movie that is on development. This of course points to me to another problem the march of science is making for the idea that replicants can blend with the population, I know that better resolutions will be available for body scans, it will be hard to miss the relief text or “engraved”\* number trademarks. - Not likely to be engraved, as 3d printing is already being developed for biological materials like bone, any trademarks or serial numbers will be added right away in the printing process. ---
**Author:** ![ricksummon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ricksummon/32/3333_2.png) [@ricksummon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ricksummon)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2013, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/56 "2013-01-05T23:27:06Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > As I mentioned before, the cultural significance of animals is largely dropped from the movie, but in the book the possibility of an artificial bear presumably wouldn’t have made a lot of difference in a human’s emotional response to the question. Killing an animal would be as offensive to them as killing a baby, maybe even worse. The [Blade Runner video game](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blade_Runner_(1997_video_game)) actually delves deeper into this idea. You play a rookie Blade Runner who’s working at the same time the movie takes place — and your first case is investigating an “animal murder” committed by replicants. A tough female Blade Runner scoffs that “those goddamn skin jobs have no respect for anything that truly lives and breathes”. While the game isn’t “canonical”, it definitely implies that killing animals is a very big deal in a future where real animals are very rare. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2013, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403/57 "2013-01-06T01:42:35Z")
Honestly, having seen “Prometheus” I’m a lot less inclined these days to think Ridley Scott is a subtle uber genius working on multiple levels, to thinking he was simply lucky enough to have done an entertaining film with a structure people can read a huge amount into re intentionality. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-replicants-in-blade-runner-actually-human/607403.md?page=2)