Blade Runner and a Serious Man
Blade Runner
The question is: It’s clear that the androids in “Blade Runner” act and speak just like humans. Does that imply that they have minds just like ours, too? Or do we have any reason to believe that these androids have minds at all?
The fact that we can communicate with one another makes us to be automatically in a relationship: Since each of the persons is able to share pieces of information.
As regarding the question: it really does imply that the androids do have minds likes us but differ in some elements. This is because the human mind is made in such a way that one can make independent judgment and decisions over something. Take an example where the main lead character of the movie Blade Runner Deckard is reassigned to his original role duties of a Blade which is to ‘retire’ the replicant. He makes decision that are solely his own to not kill Rachel whom he discovers that she is knows not of her true form i.e. the she is a replicant/android. This fact compels us to wonder why he did not follow the orders he was given by the Police unit on earth to hunt and kill the replicants/androids who had breached the code of banishment –which was to oblige to their duties on earth colonies.
This fact coincidentally relates to the Thomas Nagel’s question in philosophy “what is it like to be a bat?” where he claims that it is utterly impracticable to actually know what it is like to be in another’s perception (Cahn). The character Rachel had doubts On the discovery that she is not a human being that she may ever be loved by the man who was supposedly supposed to execute all the replicants who had been on earth illegally. Deckard’s action to follow her into a crowd on the discovery that she is not human prompts Rachel to go in to hiding, but before this happens an incident takes place immediately after the attempt pursuit of Rachel by Dekard.This particular episode presents us with another opportunity to second the claim by Thomas Nagel (it is utterly impossible to truly discern what it is like to be in another’s consciousness). Rachel is in fact present at this incident which was a fight between Deckard and Leon one of the rogue replicants who were at earth illegally. The fight was as a result of a burning desire to avenge a replicants death .As the fight ensues Rachel from a distance manages to find Deckard gun which had apparently slipped from its holster. She then points the gun and shoots at her own kind, and leaves Deckard alive. In this case some viewers would have expected for her to kill Deckard and escape with Leon other would her may be expected her to eliminate both of them and escape. This proves that it is utterly impossible to know that it is like to be in another’s consciousness- as Rachel’s predicament at the holding of the gun was impossible to deduce her next course of action.
Moreover this tends to justify our believe, that our minds and the minds of androids are somewhat the same as the exposure to learning opportunities tends to develop our consciousness with the sole purpose of acting independently in some decisions. The androids were made by being exposed to high levels of intelligent material; on the other hand man is no different as they are the one who initiated the process of making these beings.
A serious Man
In the movie “A Serious Man” the main character faced a moral problem: should he take the bribe money from his student and give the student an undeserved good grade or not.
Well: the lead role in the movie “A serious man” should not in an y way accept the money from the two cons who are out mostly determined to get their way in an attempt to ‘feel happy’ on the expenses of another man’s weakness. However to some extent they could follow a different approach in dealing with the matter, as this was an attempt to get intellectual pleasure on the interest of the student. The student had failed in his exams –this prompted the professor to grade his grades with a negative mark… Such a result is undesirable and in this case failure sought of leaves ones desires unfulfilled and moreover get a need to feel right tends to test ones consciousness.
The student interestingly does not dispute the intervention of the father who threatens to black mail the professor with his moral problem. Such a factor relays to John Stuart Mills who as well argues that intellectual and ethical pleasures are better to more physical forms of pleasure that every man tends to be predisposed to (Cahn).He further distinguishes happiness and contentment, and claims that happiness has a higher value
He additionally describes the difference between elevated and lesser forms of happiness with the principles that those who have experienced both tend to prefer one over the other. This fact is evident whenever there is always a desire by human beings to get what they hearts really desire to seek satisfaction is inevitable. It never ends as
Mills would further advice the professor’s predicament by telling him that he should make a choice on the faculties that tend to guide human instincts to make choices: As higher faculty depicts ones happiness.
Moreover John Stuart Mills is likely to counsel the professor on how to discriminate between higher quality pleasures in a situation which requires on to make choices that are similar to predicaments. Here the professor should know that higher quality pleasure is distinguished by the number of people who opt to have a particular pleasure as opposed to another. The majority would obtain the preference and tends to reveal the true desires/expectations of happiness in every human beings life. Hence by asking a few questions to the people he would trust or have been in a similar position to give ethical advice to him he would then be better off than depending on his own judgment.
In summary in order to deliberate on a form of moral judgment on an action or for an action, Utilitarianism thus takes them into account not just quantity of preferences but also the quality of the pleasures resulting from it.
“It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool or the pigs: are of different opinions, it is because they only know their side of the question”. Therefore people who may have the mandate to arbitrate over the quality of pleasure are people who have experienced the higher and the lower quality of pleasure.

Work cited
Cahn, Steven.Exploring Philosophy: An Introductory Anthology, New York, Oxford University Press, 2009.