Philosophy in Anime

[Sukunai]

Ghost in the Shell. The only anime to totally blow me away with deep thinking.

What IS is to be human?
If you download your mind into a machine, are you still human?

How much of your physical self is required to still be a human and not a machine?

Is our mind really organic at all?

Yes, fortunately anime is not all bouncy tits, panty shots and naked school girls in hot springs.
Nor is it fight scenes that take several episodes to resolve and outrageous space ships with inexhaustible sums of weapons.

I've never watched the Ghost in the Shell series though. Didn't want to risk it ruining my memories of a truly awesome movie.

[Willen]

I've never watched the Ghost in the Shell series though. Didn't want to risk it ruining my memories of a truly awesome movie.

The GitS: Stand Alone Complex series are pretty different from the movie in feel and direction. It shares the same cast, but it's more thriller/suspense/action show with some of the themes of the movie. They are good on their own. And some of the same philosophical questions are brought up in some of the episodes and story arcs.

Are the Tachikomas alive?

If you can download your self to a machine that means you can treat your 'ghost' like data, what happens if you get a virus (the computer kind)? If your 'ghost' data gets corrupted...

If your body is already artificial and you can treat your memories like data and make copies of them, what's to stop you from making multiple copies of yourself? And then, which is the real you?

If an android acts like a human, and you treat it like another human, does its status change? How different are they from a previously biological person in an artificial body?

GitS: SAC is a pretty solid series and if treated as a stand-alone work (pun intended), shouldn't diminish the original movie.

[Knowname]

yeah, you gotta see the tachicomas, they're not in the movie. Unless their in the second one... I forget.

[Otohiko]

yeah, you gotta see the tachicomas, they're not in the movie. Unless their in the second one... I forget.

Uh, there is most definitely a Tachikoma in the first movie. The whole final action sequence is centred around one.

[Knowname]

oh that tank?? I never noticed that lol... it never talked (to me)...

[76]

The tank in gits:sac is not a tachikoma. They are ai-driven mobile combat units, while the tank was a human operated vehicle.

There is an episode where the tachikomas discuss their individuality.

I feel that 'the girl who leapt through time' would be good discussion, though I'm not sure how to get it going.

What I conclude about individuality: is that it is a man-made justification of our dominance as a species as well as existence. In reality we have no rights and no purpose, other than what you could contrive from our instincts of survival. The very act of searching for meanings supports our lack thereof.

[76]

While I'm at it, another yarn: why is it that we assume that there must be a grand creator? Just because something is, means that there was a time when it was not?

Humans only create by reorganizing matter as we find it! There is no originality as time tells.
Is this another desperate cry for individuality?

[Panky]

While I'm at it, another yarn: why is it that we assume that there must be a grand creator? Just because something is, means that there was a time when it was not?

In fact, like you're saying, if there is a grand creator, there was a time when it was not, because the fact of thinking that it really exists, is the same than thinking that something else created it at the same time. If there is an assumption that there really is a god, it's because people in general need something to look up to, something to believe in. That way, you could get released from clearly thinking who you are, where you came from, the reason for existing, and many other existencial matters. In my case, I don't believe, but I'm pretty sure it would be that case in many other personal cases.

TGWLTT didn't seem that philosophical to me, it was more like striving for each other characters survival without further thoughts about it (that's what I think, though). The explanation about what happened in the future was never really explained so I wouldn't know more details to expand to.

Humans only create by reorganizing matter as we find it! There is no originality as time tells.Is this another desperate cry for individuality?

What did you mean with that?

[76]

It was an abstract support for my words on individuality. Since humans are incapable of creating matter we only 'create' by rearanging matter.

Sorry for the confusion.

[Panky]

It was an abstract support for my words on individuality. Since humans are incapable of creating matter we only 'create' by rearanging matter.

Sorry for the confusion.

Oh, I think I might have read that part quickly, my bad instead. I kind of get what you mean, and it's true that there's a rearranging of matters, you can't get something from somewhere there isn't. It's not like there's no originality but as time passes, there are less "new" things to "create" if that is what you're meaning. Although I don't really know if hit the point.