Spoilers Star Trek: Picard 1x02 - "Maps and Legends"

That people were racist towards them doesn't mean they were slaves. Pulaski was racist towards Data and McCoy towards Spock.

 

Those androids weren't "slaves" as they weren't sentient. I agree it would be nice to have more context like they introduced the synth's after the Dominion War to rebuild the fleet. I don't think they are going down the Battlestar Galactica route.

 

I don't know where they are headed with the two of them. But it is essentially loyalty of home and people versus loyalty to a single man.

 

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People knew about Synths. The news immediately said that "Synths attacked Mars". If they didn't know about Synths then they couldn't report on them.
And I don't consider Synths as shown to be, slave labor. They are robots with limited interaction skills and definitely not sentient. And they definitely didn't rebel, they were hacked. Now, maybe Starfleet never figured out it was a hack and blamed the Synths for the attacks (hence the ban).
In any case, they are definitely not slaves. If they are not sentient then they are not slaves.

EDIT:

Great minds think alike and are also ninjas

 

Seemed pretty sentient to me. And even sapient, what is usually erroneously meant with 'sentient' in Star Trek.

 

It's healthy to provide criticism. After all, it is clear the producers respond to it. Look at Discovery Season 2 and the way it changed after fan reaction.

I also feel it's perfectly fine to have discussion on this, which is why we have forums to begin with.

 

Yeah, that is sounding like a stealth Incel kind of comment. Like, you wouldn’t approach a woman you didn’t find attractive, but if she rejects you for not finding you attractive she’s being a b?

Maybe you should take a look at how you’re presenting yourself and whether women feel safe around you and find you attractive instead of blaming them when they don’t.

 

Fair enough..they're basically just walking versions of assembly line robots we have today then..

 

That seems like an unsupported generalization. Yes, Picard is a champion of Starfleet's most idealistic values, but that doesn't mean he's in the minority. The truth is, we most often see him espouse his views on this when facing someone who doesn't share them, which is why it comes in such stark contrast. But I'm not sure that Crusher, Riker, or Troi don't feel exactly the same way. We see some departures from this with Sisko on DS9 (one very notable departure), but actually, I think most of his character is largely consistent with that too. Janeway is a different story. But I just don't see Picard as an abnormality in this.

 

You could tell off that one two minute clip that they were sapient?

 

Then why didn't Picard make a clear distinction between him and the synths when questioned?

 

Even if they were hacked - and it's known - it's a good reason to ban them (provided they aren't self aware). I mean, it means that if they don't have a decent "firewall" your plastic pal who's fun to be with could turn around and snap your neck in a second. Who wants to deal with that.

I saw no evidence in the short scene that the type of synths shown was self-aware. Just because it looks like a human doesn't mean it has a consciousness - any more than the Horta looking nothing like a human meant that it lacked a consciousness.

 

^^^
Lol - What is it about Sir Patrick Stewart and his role as Picard that always seems to create shots and lines that can be easily co-opted to hilarious internet memes?

 

I say 'seemed'. I of course cannot tell for sure, but I cannot tell that for sure about real humans either. (See: 'hard problem of consciousness.)

 

All we saw them do in the show was try to repeat social feedback in the wrong context less effectively than season 1 Data. And they didn’t seem to have their own independent motives. It was also clear in the show no android that did not derive from Data ever replicated Data’s complexity.

Also if they were sapient, how do we know if one asked to leave they would not be allowed to?

 

Frankly, the attempts at conversation by F-8 were worse than contemporary chatbots.

 

Humans dehumanize. Sad but true. We're a total shit species. But…that doesn't mean that these synths were sentient. I'm sure some store employees do disgusting things to mannequins in stores. I'm sure they'll claim it's a "joke", even though it's not funny in any way. But none of that means the mannequins are sentient or slaves. That would devalue the concept of slavery, in my view. But it also doesn't excuse the disgusting behavior of the store employees. Rather, it should inform the kind of response one ought to have, and whom it should be directed at.

 

Premature judgement is way more fun.

Indeed. Picard's standards are extremely high.

I'm glad to see more of the Romulans and even more variety.

That's the spirit that will get us through these hard times...

Good grief. I get more optimism from working with people with mental health challenges than from Star Trek fans.

 

Mastering human social interaction and having complex motives are not required for sentience. Babies are sentient, gold fish are sentient (or that seems likely given the current scientific understanding.) Sure, the synths could be just automatons, but lacking the qualities you mention doesn't prove that they are nor would possessing them mean that they aren't.

We don't. And that's why I said earlier that argument that they're slaves was baseless.