Which of the following is a strident sound?

The vocal tract ___________________________.

What is the major muscle of the lip?

Which Presocratic philosopher used fire imagery to solve the problem of the one and the many?

Which of the following ideas best expresses how Democritus understood the universe?

Midterm Exam — Science Fiction & EthicsFormat: This is a multi-day in-class writing assignment. You will write your essay across two class sessions (Monday and Wednesday, 85 minutes each). This exam is administered through Blackboard using Honorlock screen recording and Browser Guard. You may not access any outside materials, devices, or applications during the exam.Between Sessions: After Day 1, you will be able to view your Day 1 writing, but you will not be able to edit it. Use the time between sessions to think about your argument, consider what you want to revise or expand, and plan how to use your Day 2 session. You will not be able to bring notes with you to Day 2.Day 2: You will receive the full text of your Day 1 writing along with a fresh essay box. You may copy and paste from your Day 1 text to restructure, revise, and continue your work. Your Day 2 submission is what will be graded.Quotation Bank: You have access to the quotation bank you prepared and uploaded in advance if you did so.Target Length: 800–1,500 words (but there is no real maximum/minimum word count). Quality matters more than quantity.Requirements:Present a clear thesis and argue for it.Engage substantively with at least two of our primary sources (Parfit, Siderits, Huemer).Consider at least one serious objection to your position and respond to it.Observe the Forbidden Case Constraint (explained below).The Forbidden Case Constraint:For the purposes of this exam, the judiciary has been thoroughly convinced of both Parfitian Reductionism and the Buddhist Doctrine of No-Self. You may not argue that the clones are straightforwardly different persons from Sam Bell whose independent consent is required. The most obvious objection: that the clones are separate people and this is simply slavery,  is not available to you. You must work within the reductionist framework to make your case.Stipulated Facts (unless your scenario modifies them):Sam Bell Prime was aware of the cloning arrangement and consented to it.Sam Bell Prime completed the first authentic three-year contract under the same isolated conditions as the clones.Sam Bell Prime is being compensated for all labor performed by the clones.The clones are designed with a biologically limited lifespan of approximately three years.Each clone experiences only its own three-year stint with no cumulative effects from prior cycles.The clones were never intended to discover the truth. The events of the film represent a malfunction.Robotic or AI-based solutions are not viable alternatives for this operation.The Corporation’s Concession: The corporation concedes that the specific events of the film, where two clones discover the truth, represent a failure and a breach of its duty. It owes Sam Bell compensation for this negligence. However, it maintains that the underlying arrangement, when operating as designed, is morally permissible.The Shortened ContractScenario Modification:Suppose that Lunar Industries, responding to ethical review, shortens the clone contract from three years to two years. Each clone is activated, performs two years of mining work, and is then painlessly euthanized while believing it is returning to Earth. The clones still have a biologically limited lifespan (approximately three years), but they serve only two-thirds of it. The remainder — one year of decline and worsening feelings of isolation — is avoided through the early termination. The clones’ psychological experience during their two years is substantively similar to the original three-year arrangement, just compressed: they still believe they are the original Sam Bell, they still receive the simulated video messages from Tess, and they still look forward to going home. Sam Bell Prime has consented to this arrangement.Your Task:Does shortening the contract to two years change the moral status of the arrangement? Write an essay in which you argue either that the reduced duration meaningfully mitigates the moral concerns, or that the core moral problems persist regardless of the contract’s length. Your argument must operate within the reductionist framework (observe the Forbidden Case Constraint) and engage substantively with at least two of our primary sources.

Day 2 InstructionsWelcome to Day 2 of the Midterm Exam. Below you will find the full text of what you wrote on Day 1. You may copy and paste from it freely as you continue working.Your Day 2 submission is what will be graded. Use this session to:Continue writing where you left off.Revise, restructure, or strengthen your argument.Add engagement with sources you did not address on Day 1.Develop your response to objections more fully.Reminder: Your essay should be 800–1,500 words. All original exam instructions and constraints still apply.A note on your Day 1 essay: Your final paragraph raises an objection based on the claim that the clones “have no soul” and no real connection to Sam Bell. Be careful here, review the Forbidden Case Constraint. Consider whether this objection is available to you under the terms of the exam, and if it is not, replace it with an objection that works within the reductionist framework. Also remember that you are required to engage substantively with at least two of our primary sources.Day 2 Wrinkle: As you continue your essay, consider the following claim from Parfit: the reductionist view does not entail that we should be less concerned about our future welfare rather it entails that we should be more concerned about the welfare of others. How does this claim bear on the argument you are making?Your Day 1 Writing:A clone escaped from Lunar Industries and made it to earth. Lunar Industries after consulting with Sam Bell, has decided to make changes to how their moon base operates. Lunar Industries has decided that it will now shorten the time frame that it uses the clones of Sam Bell in attempt to prevent another situation where a clone could make it back to earth and upset operations on both the Moon and the life of Sam Prime.  The reduction of the contract from three to two years does not change the moral status of the arrangement. In fact, the reduced duration mitigates some moral concerns. One of the concerns that can be brought up is the potential for an escape to happen. When a clone escapes to the surface it can cause a disruption to Sam Bell primes life as the clone will believe that he is Sam Bell, just a younger Sam and will act accordingly to what he knows. While Sam prime is psychologically connected to the Sam clones that connectedness is not great as Sam Prime has lived longer and is not that same as the clone is in that way, as the clone is repeating the same three years that Sam did originally. Since they are not one in the same this could lead to the clone lashing out, feeling robbed of his life, and, since they are psychologically identical, making whatever bad decisions Sam is capable of making in order to get what he may perceive as justice. With this chance of escape reduced Sam prime, the Sam clones nor Sam’s family will have to suffer from the trauma and confusion that such a situation could cause.With the shortened time frame on the new contract another moral issue that is being lessened is what happens to the Sam clones when they breakdown at the end of the third year. This deterioration of the body leads to physical decline, pain, anxiety and feelings of loneliness and isolation. By shorting the time until ethical euthanasia we reduce the suffering of the Sam clones both physically and psychologically. Allowing the clones to serve the full three-year term of the contact only to start to breakdown and suffer while still requiring them to work is questionable, as we are making the Sam clones suffer and it is this very suffering that caused the incident on the Lunar Industries moon base that brought this entire situation into motion. With this reduction in time by a full year and the early termination of the Sam clones cycle we lessen the problem.  There are those that will not agree with this view, that this is not ethical to kill someone, but this is what Sam Bell agreed to with Lunar Industries. Since the clones are Sam Bell, since they share a psychological connectedness with them his decision is what matters here. Even though Sam and his clones are qualitatively identical, exactly alike, they are not numerically identical, or one in the same person. So, Sam may have decided that this (ethical euthanasia) was the best plan for himself if placed in a situation, where rather than suffer he would rather be put down quickly, and painlessly, and this is how the clones should be treated as well since they are Sam. In fact, Lunar Industries and Sam may claim that Sam is getting a better deal than the original deal that Sam agreed to since Sam prime had to do a three-year tour and now the Sam clones are only doing a two-year job.A problem that someone may argue against the entire arrangement is that it is not Sam Bell doing the work. That he is not there that he has no connection to the clones even though they are physically identical they have no soul. This argument is one that would be making the claim on behalf of personal identity and the idea of the cartesionan ego.

Day 2 InstructionsWelcome to Day 2 of the Midterm Exam. Below you will find the full text of what you wrote on Day 1. You may copy and paste from it freely as you continue working.Your Day 2 submission is what will be graded. Use this session to:Continue writing where you left off.Revise, restructure, or strengthen your argument.Add engagement with sources you did not address on Day 1.Develop your response to objections more fully.Reminder: Your essay should be 800–1,500 words. All original exam instructions and constraints still apply.A note on your Day 1 Essay: You raise the one-to-one relation issue through Huemer, and that’s a genuinely important observation, but you move past it too quickly. Consider whether the overlapping clones scenario connects to Parfit’s own discussion of branching cases and what happens to identity when Relation R holds between one person and multiple continuers. This is not the same as arguing the clones are “straightforwardly different persons” (which the Forbidden Case Constraint prohibits). It is an argument from within the reductionist framework about what happens to the corporation’s analogy when the one-to-many structure is made explicit. Also, make sure your engagement with Siderits goes beyond quoting, explain how the passage you cite connects to the specific claim you’re making.Day 2 Wrinkle: As you continue your essay, consider the following claim from Parfit: the reductionist view does not entail that we should be less concerned about our future welfare rather it entails that we should be more concerned about the welfare of others. How does this claim bear on the argument you are making?Your Day 1 Writing:     My first thought when seeing this modification to the scenario is that it make little to no difference to the moral status of the arrangement when looking through the eyes of the corporation. In this modification both clones are still operating the same way and under the same deception. Therefore when it comes to the moral status nothing has really changed other than the fact that there is one more lie added on top but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything  to the corporation when you think of all the morally unjust things already happening within the arrangement. They could also make the argument that the second clone would have been woken up at the end of the current clones time anyways so it doesn’t make a difference. Huemer would argue that this is because the “one-to-one relation” has been broken therefore Sam Bells identity cannot be with two different people experiencing two different lives. Furthermore, becoming different people based on those separate experiences.  This could be argued with every clone used in the operation whether two used at once or not. This is because each Sam Bell experience is slightly different even if not in big ways they experience different thoughts, dreams, and issues. As we know these things though seemingly very small make an impact on who we are and how we change further separating the clones from each other and from the original Sam Bell. Since, we are not arguing against the corporation as a whole and the judiciary has been convinced that the clones are in fact not different people and are convinced of the Buddhist Doctrine of No-Self we are unable to stand on this argument. Siderits gives the example “Uddyotakara next considers a new Buddhist strategy: when we say the self does not exist, by “self” we only mean something you imagine to exist.” to further explain the Doctrine of No-Self. When using this argument with the given situation you could argue that we project Sam Bell onto the clones. Therefore this is nothing wrong with the arrangement using two clones at once and that is a given right to them by the original Sam Bell. Making it so as long as the operation functions the same way for both as it always planned to there is no further moral issue with them using two clones simultaneously to further progress the work.

Your Quotation Bank:“Our identity over time just involves (a) Relation R – Psychological connectedness and/or psychological continuity – with the right kind of cause, provided (b) that this relation does not take a ‘branching’ form, holding between one person and two different future people.”Parfit, Reasons and Persons, p.216Parfit is arguing in the branch line case that personal identity is not physical.“A Reductionist can admit that, in this sense, a person is what has these experiences, or the subject of experiences.”Parfit, Reasons and Persons, p.223Parfit explains that Reductionists do not think that the person experiencing something is a separate being from mind and body.”A person is an entity that has a brain and body, and has particular thoughts, desires and so on.”Parfit, Reasons and Persons, p.211This is the Reductionist view on a person as a distinct entity.“If personal identity is what matters, I should regard my prospect here as being nearly as bad as ordinary death. But if what matters is Relation R, with any cause, I should regard this way of dying as being about as good as ordinary survival.”Parfit, Reasons and Persons, p.215Parfit is explaining the two different views on the branch-line case.“The Soul is also said to be the subject of mental states (it is your soul, rather than your body, that experiences thoughts, feelings, and so on.)”Huemer, Knowledge, Reality, and Value, p.205Huemer is explaining people’s general idea of what the Soul is.“Identity is a one-to-one relation: Every being is identical with exactly one being; no one is ever identical with two beings.”Huemer, Knowledge, Reality, and Value, p.207This is the first of Humer’s four principles about identity.“Both copies satisfy the criterion for being you, so they are both you. But this cannot be: it violates the basic definition for numerical identity (which, again, is the what we are interested in.)”Huemer, Knowledge, Reality, and Value, p.202Huemer is explaining the issue with the “perfect clone” problem.“Uddyotakara next considers a new Buddhist strategy: when we say the self does not exist, by “self” we only mean something you imagine to exist.”Siderits, Buddhism as Philosophy, p.142The Buddhist explanation to the doctrine of no self.“If it were said that the self is imaginatively projected onto the body, as Santa Claus is projected onto the person who puts the presents under the tree, then there would have to be a self to be projected into the body.”Siderits, Buddhism as Philosophy, p.143-144Siderits further explains that it’s believed that self is just a thing imagined and put onto a body.

Day 2 InstructionsWelcome to Day 2 of the Midterm Exam. Below you will find the full text of what you wrote on Day 1. You may copy and paste from it freely as you continue working.Your Day 2 submission is what will be graded.Use this session to:Continue writing where you left off.Revise, restructure, or strengthen your argument.Add engagement with sources you did not address on Day 1.Develop your response to objections more fully.Reminder: Your essay should be 800–1,500 words. All original exam instructions and constraints still apply.A note on your Day 1 essay: Your essay uses this passage from Parfit: “each person’s existence just involves the existence of a brain and body, a doing of certain deeds, the thinking of certain thoughts, the occurrence of certain experiences” as a checklist: the clone has a brain, a body, does deeds, thinks thoughts, therefore Sam Bell is still alive. But Parfit is not offering a diagnostic test for whether someone counts as the same person. He is describing what all of personal identity reduces to: there is no further fact beyond these elements. The question Parfit is actually asking is whether Relation R (psychological continuity and connectedness) holds between two beings, and what follows morally when it does or doesn’t. Your essay needs to engage with Relation R directly, not treat the passage you’ve quoted as a parts list. When you do this, you’ll find that some of your best ideas (especially the argument about Lunar Industries owing Eve a version of Sam) become significantly stronger, because you’ll be able to ground them in what Parfit actually argues rather than in speculation about what Sam Prime probably wanted. Day 2 Wrinkle: As you continue your essay, consider the following claim from Parfit: the reductionist view does not entail that we should be less concerned about our future welfare rather it entails that we should be more concerned about the welfare of others. How does this claim bear on the argument you are making?  Your Day 1 Writing: Does the death of Sam Bell Prime change the moral status of the arrangement?            In order to give any merit to the claim that something should or should not change in the agreement between Sam Bell and Lunar Industries we must first examine if this fact is even true. According to Parfitian reduction-ism the death of Sam Prime is completely irrelevant to the case of whether or not the clones should be morally permissible to work on the moon.  Based solely on the fact that Sam Bell is not dead. Parfit clear lays outs reductinism by its components (almost ironically). He states INSERT NEW QUOTE”On the reductionist view each person’s existence just involves the existence of a brain and body, a doing of certain deeds, the thinking of certain thoughts, the occurrence of certain experiences and so on”. While he does leave some room open for interpretation the interpretation falls on the idea that there is more things that can make and individual qualitatively the same. With all of the premises he has listed for us we can see that Sam Bell is still alive. Sam Bell still has a brain and body, he is doing the same certain deeds, Sam is still thinking the same certain thoughts, and has similar experiences to the original Sam Prime. By all matters of reductionism Sam Bell is still a live and well, working on the moon to provide for his daughter and his society at home.transition sentenceWhat would stay the same?                Sam Bell prime was fully aware that at one point there would be an end to his life. Assuming that Sam Prime is aware of this fact and wants what is best for him and his family we can assume that he would want the work to continue. It is hard to imagine the alternative where a loving father would not want his children to be supported even after his death. Many people take out large life insurance policies to ensure the safety of their kids. I have heard of a specific case where a stock broker even suffered such a loss that he committed suicide in order for the life insurance policy to take care of his kids financially instead of them having to suffer the burden of financial instability of the father selling all assets in order to make up for his estates.transition sentence                 In addition to the previous idea of Sam Prime’s probable wants for his loved one’s. I think it can be implied that Sam likely had planned to die before the clones ran out. Assuming a starting point of 25 (this is cutting into the younger side of what was more than likely to be his age given that he was qualified to operate multi-billion dollar assets on the moon) and adding three years for each additional clone that was present on the moon ; we can see that Sam Prime did in fact plan for the clones to outlive him. In the scene with the “hidden room” that the clones find we can see that there is well more than 30 clones of Sam Prime, all ready to pick up where the next one left off. With a little calculations (25 Sam Prime years + 3*30 clones= 115 years of Sam Prime’s life)  it is evident that Sam Prime would be irrational to believe that he could live out the clones. This concept further asserts that Sam Prime would want the clones to continue his service as a part of lunar industries.Transitional Paragraph What would change about the agreement?          I personally believe that while the death of Sam Prime does not really change the agreement of his obligation to work on the moon I think it does raise an interesting moral question about the responsibilities of Lunar industries to return Sam Bell back home to his daughter. While Sam Prime most likely foresaw that the the clones would outlive him; Sam Prime probably did not imagine that he would die a premature death on Earth. We must then look at what the agreement said about Sam’s return trip. If the Lunar industries had any responsibilities in the death of Sam Prime should they not be held accountable to provide eve with a father? The entire agreement sits on this Idea that if Sam does his duties he will get to live a happy and fruitful life with his family and not be strained by financial hardship or time away for work ever again. I believe there is a case to be made about the obligation of Lunar Industries to ship home a clone or even possibly clones in order to be with his family. If there is no version of Sam Bell at home then the argument can be made that there is no longer a Sam Bell. We can see this through the violation of reductionist beliefs on what a makes a person. Parfit states  “On the reductionist view each person’s existence just involves the existence of a brain and body, a doing of certain deeds, the thinking of certain thoughts, the occurrence of certain experiences and so on”. If there is no Sam at home taking care of his family then we are missing the criteria of “a doing of certain deeds”. If the elements of reductionism are missing then we no longer have a person. If Sam Bell still had the same body, brain and doing of deeds but no similar thinking of thoughts then we would not have the same person. We just have a shell that partakes in similar behaviors of Sam Bell. Twins are not the same person if the are identical and go to the same school and participate in the same activities. So why do we get to claim that the Sam Bell that is no longer taking care of his family the same person?