Orcs, Evil, etc. (Part 2)

(continued from Part 1)

. . . but that was Tolkien's world.

There does seem a strong trend in the current era of trying to humanize the Other. In a lot of senses I think this is a good impulse. I suspect that viewing other living creatures (and people in particular) as having more than just a material value, makes one take a greater interest in creating and maintaining beneficial institutions. Empathizing with those not like oneself and feeling some bond of fellowship is both important in society and provides interesting narrative opportunities.

In the real world I feel we need to love and respect other humans, even treat animals well. But I always feel a little cautious about ascribing such human traits to non-humans.  In the real world I think many folks make a distinction:

• Human: Intelligent. Capable of culture, self-reflection, empathy and caring. Is inherently worthy of some measure of respect.

• Animal: Less intelligent. Culture? Self-reflection? Empathy? Maybe worthy of affection, or maybe is food or unpaid labor.

We can't currently build AIs that fully emulate human mental states. But there's ELIZA, and I'm sure other programs that could increasingly convince us we are interacting with a person.
What if machines are developed to emulate or even better humans at creating cultural artifacts and institutions, giving the outward signs of self-reflection or caring; but it turns out the devices are just really good at copying social cues without any understanding of what they mean? The perfect encoding of shallow affect?

There are certainly those in real life who would try to exploit our sympathies to further their own purposes, and those folks have some capacity to think like we do. In a fantasy (or horror) setting all bets are off as to whether human norms apply at all. Keep on the Borderlands' orcs might have nurturing families, but maybe this next setting's orcs aren't people-ish. Maybe they are just biological machines programmed with complex behaviors, but no emotions other than rage and a hunger to kill.

• Storm troopers are of course people, sure, albeit hostile ones.
• Vampires? Corrupt, but at least a bit person-y.
• Zombies? Maybe there's a tiny shred of the old person in there, and enough appearance to play on our sympathies, but we probably don't consider them people.
• Robot? People or not depending on the nature of the setting and whims of fellow characters.

But these are all just common conventions. Part of the fantastical nature of the genre means that outward appearances can deceive. So, in any given setting, any one of these categories might have more or less person-like qualities internally than generally portrayed. And I tend to think that in either case (fake or really, person-y or non-person-like) these elements could make for part of an interesting setting.