Parents are guardians, not owners, of their children, seems to be the common libertarian view. Owning another person would be slavery, a contradiction of liberty.
Hypothetically, if I built a robot that performed certain programmed functions like cooking my food or vacuuming my home, it would be my property. If I upgraded the robot so that it was sentient, the seemingly common libertarian view claims I cannot own it. Since I own all the materials which compose the robot, I believe I own the materials when combined to form a sentient robot. This logic seemingly applies to children. The sperm, egg, and development are materials with owners, thus when combined to form a baby, it seemingly should have an owner(s), not a guardian(s).
I dislike that conclusion, since it justifies slavery of children, but I want to know if it is flawed.
What do you all think?
I don't know if that analogy fully stands. A child, while initially created from the material of its parents, eventually (after birth) generates his own (i.e. grows and develops). This is not the case for the robot.
The moment a living human or robot has free will AND is able to communicate with you (communicative ability), it deserves its natural rights.
If your kid wouldn't have free will or your robot/animal is not able to communicate rationally with you, than you own it and the rights of your kid/animal/robot become technical: It might be a vice to hurt them for no good reason, but it's not unlawful.
“A child, while initially created from the material of its parents, eventually (after birth) generates his own (i.e. grows and develops). This is not the case for the robot.”
I did not think of this, Angurse. What if, instead of a robot, I create a biological creature in a laboratory which develops? The materials before, during, and after the creature’s development are mine, therefore I am the owner, correct?
“The moment a living human or robot has free will AND is able to communicate with you (communicative ability), it deserves its natural rights.”
If the sentient entity was not created with materials owned by someone else, I would agree with you, but property ownership seems to transfer as I explained to Angurse.
I do not want to win this argument. I want someone to prove the logic I am using is flawed.