What it Means to be Human: Blade Runner 2049

Kilian Pötter Introduces the big ideas and problems around artificial consciousness.

- Kilian Pötter

In the 2016 movie Blade Runner 2049, Ryan Gosling plays the replicant K (short for his serial number KD 6-3.7) in a dystopian future in Los Angeles. Replicants are bioengineered humanoids who serve humans, despite having superior strength and intelligence. K is a Blade Runner, whose job is to 'retire' (kill) renegade replicants for the Los Angeles Police Department. One day, he finds information that a replicant might have been born from another replicant, which no one thought was possible. This revelation could lead to political tensions between humans and replicants, who may now start to fight for recognition and rights. Hence, K's task is to find and retire that replicant to prevent a conflict.

In the conversation between K and his superior about killing the replicant, K hesitates when he receives the order. K explains his hesitancy by saying something that can easily be overlooked, but which idea guides the whole movie: "To be born is to have a soul, I guess."

This sentence is essential for the film. K is implying that by being born, the new replicant has inherited some special humanlike feature. So far, humans have enslaved replicants based on the premise that replicants are just AI and hence not as worthy as their human masters. If a replicant could have been born naturally, the 'artificial slavery' basis of society might be challenged.

To understand if the societal order in Blade Runner 2049 must be altered, we must first discover what defines a human being and gives humans worth. This question of what makes us human runs through the whole plot. K begins to think that he might be the replicant-born child who is therefore similar to humans. So let's start to explore the question: What makes us human?

The Question of Consciousness