In the 1982 film Blade Runner by director Ridley Scott there is
a genuine attempt to engage with philosophical thinking. Blade
Runner is a science fiction film set in the year 2019 where humans
have colonised other planets and allowed planet earth to become a
wasteland. Humans have created replicates of themselves that are
just as intelligent and are capable of having emotions but they
only have short lives.
The replicates in the film, attempt to extend their lives by
finding their creator (The Tyrrel Corporation) and taking their
power away from them. The replicates are being hunted down by blade
runners in order to retire them or in other words exterminate
them.
The main philosophical idea the film explores is “What it means
to be human”. The replicates are made up of synthetic materials but
have a full emotional life, whilst the humans are portrayed as
heartless and with selfish interests. It quickly becomes apparent
that the replicates have more humanity than the humans do. The
question of what makes us human is a theme blade runner attempts to
explore in depth throughout the whole film.
The film conveys the idea that simple diagnostic criteria for
deciding who or what is or is not human are bound to fail and that
what it means to be human isn't so much an objective fact that's
out there in the world waiting for us to discover, but rather it
has more to do with our attitudes toward one another. Being human
is more like a social construct than it is an objective fact. Now,
that doesn't mean that objective facts in the world aren't
relevant—they're very relevant and they're probably
necessary—they're just not sufficient.