The Measure of a Man (Star Trek: The Next Generation)

While the USS Enterprise-D is docked at a new Starbase for routine maintenance, they are paid a visit by resident cyberneticist Commander Bruce Maddox. Maddox was on the commission that years earlier determined Data's eligibility to enter Starfleet Academy; Maddox had cast the only dissenting vote on the grounds that Data, an android, was not a sentient being. Maddox explains that he wants Data to help him understand better how his creator Dr. Noonien Soong was able to overcome certain problems when designing Data's positronic brain.

Data is intrigued until he discovers that it is Maddox's intention to download Data's memories into another computer, deactivate him, and then disassemble him. Data points out that Maddox doesn't have the necessary knowledge to carry out this procedure safely, and so he refuses to undergo it.

Maddox then issues an order backed up by Starfleet command for Data to submit himself to disassembly. Picard refuses to allow Data to go along with the order and Data concludes that only his resignation will allow him to circumvent the order. Maddox, however, contends that Data cannot resign as he is the property of Starfleet, not a sentient being with rights.

Picard persuades Starfleet Judge Advocate General Philippa Louvois, who had previously court-martialed him over the loss of the Stargazer, to hold a hearing to determine Data's status. Having to use available personnel, the JAG officer drafts Commander Riker to represent the prosecution, and Captain Picard to serve as Data's defense counsel.

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I'm currently reading a book called:

Is Data Human? The Metaphysics of Star Trek by Richard Hanley

Data is the character on Star Trek who most often struggles with what it is to be human. But why does he want to be human, and would being human make Data better or worse with regards to how he is? For that matter what *is* being human? What does it entail, and who and what can be human?

Metaphysics literally means "beyond Physics", so that Metaphysics studies everything but physics, so dealing with the questions of what is it to be human, what makes us human, and what is a person fit right under its purview.

Richard Hanley also looks at the questions of a soul, and whether one is necessary to be human. Since a soul cannot be split in two, this would beg the question of whether humans split by a transporter function had a soul. Did one of them get it? Neither of them? And if one of them did get it, which one? If the two split people were never rejoined, which is the soulless one, and how can we tell?

But that certainly isn't all that is discussed in this book. It takes on logic versus emotions, and which is better, What makes someone a person, and how can Starfleet tell when they have found intelligent life, if it is very different from themselves? And are their universals in cognition and linguistics?
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So this episode will be interesting to watch again. Can't wait. On at 10:00 PM Eastern.