Androids To Kill Quotes Analysis

Despite his struggles with the moral responsibility, Rick appears to be morally conflicted the whole novel while he simply continues to act in our standards of immoral. The laws of the world that Rick lives in does not reflect the typical laws that readers would have experienced in their own lives. The murdering of androids is not seen as a morally corrupt act to do; it is accepted and seen as necessary. Rick details this when he says, “In retiring—i.e., killing—an andy, he did not violate the rule of life laid down by Mercer. You shall kill only the killers, Mercer had told them the year empathy boxes first appeared on Earth” (Dick 21). As this quote suggests, the justification is there to support why the androids should die. They had to murder …show more content…
Schein and Gray explained that immorality exists on a spectrum, and this belief of what is immortal is based in “perceived harm” (Schein and Gray 33). This perceived harm is how the person views the harm committed against a person and evaluates if the harm is enough to judge the act as morally wrong. As seen in this novel, Rick does not appear to be bothered by this moral decision to end androids’ lives for a good portion of the novel while readers observe this “perceived harm” done to androids and exhibit the responses that Schein and Gray report are typical whereas Rick does not feel the same way. There is not this reflection on the harm that he causes the androids or the devastation he brings to the end of their lives. The readers can expect people who commit immoral crimes to look at themselves reflective and to have remorse and regret for doing so, yet Rick does not exhibit this self-reflection for a while. He slowly emphasizes with them, for certain, but to actual reflect and debate on whether or not it is wrong is not a decision he makes until the very end of the