More Human Than Human: Exploring Philip K. Dick's Definition of "The Authentic Human Being" in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and Blade Runner

This essay explores the philosophical themes of Philip K. Dick’s science fiction novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and its film adaptation, Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner. More specifically, this paper explores Philip K. Dick’s question of “What Constitutes the Authentic Human Being?” and how “the question of what it means to be human” is presented in both Dick’s novel and Scott’s film adaptation. Since Scott’s film is a loose adaptation that diverges significantly from its source novel, it raises the question of how both versions attempt to tackle this issue in their own manner. Despite pointing out similarities between the films, it should be stressed that the goal of the essay is not to directly compare the two versions and analyze how well the novel’s themes translate onto film, but to analyze the novel and film individually and discuss their distinct viewpoints on the issue of what it means to be human. The conclusion of this essay is that while the novel and film still share a similar theme in regards to their focus on the nature of being human, there appears to be a difference between the overall message of both novel and film. Furthermore, in regards to the novel, this paper reaches the conclusion that the novel does not convey a definite answer on the definition of humanity but rather hints at a constantly shifting definition of humanity where humanity itself is like an illusion. Conversely, the film seems to describe humanity as a definite trait that can be acquired, even by artificial humans. Both the novel and film use complex emotions such as empathy to blur the boundaries between human and machine, but the main difference is that in the novel, a human learns the meaning of being human, while in the film an android learns the meaning of humanity