Yesterday, I accidentally dropped my phone on to the kitchen floor, spilled ketchup on my new pants, and left some plates unwashed in the sink. I experienced no major negative consequences though. Also, the events were all results of my interactions with my own belongings, therefore I have the right to treat them any way I wish.

There was one consequence: I felt guilty.

Maybe because I had just watched a video on Shintoism during the New Years, I felt sorry for the phone that got suddenly hit, for my pants that lost its laundry virginity, and for the plates that were neglected overnight. In fact, while the events left no negative effects on myself, it probably did on my objects, especially if they had emotions—like in the Shinto belief. In that case, the objects may have the right to reject or object to my actions; which unfortunately they don’t appear to be able to do.

In our current society— at least in London, United Kingdom 2022— objects have no legal outline of their rights; nor have they ever asked for ‘object rights’ before. No scientific research supports or implies the existence of objects’ emotions, therefore the possibilities of objects’ feelings only appear in imaginations or spirituality. Consequently, objects’ emotional sensitivity is unapproved as being ‘real’. It seems rational enough that objects’ welfare is not empathetically considered in the current legislation system.

Interestingly, this seemingly simple conclusion exposes multiple flaws in law.

This essay challenges the tolerated neglecting of object rights by [1] observing the current law through different cases, [2] analyzing the justifications of each legal judgement, and [3] clarifying their flaws. The following [4] proposal is designed to stimulate more people to discover the believability of the objects’ possible intellectual and emotional sensitivity.

[1] The Four Cases

Here are four examples of abuse. All cases are caused by me, and based on the general understanding of ethics and British legal standards, I am judged differently depending on the characteristics of the victim.

^{(A: abuse to human - I kicked Cherrie out of curiosity, and broke her leg.)}

In this case, Human Rights protect Cherrie’s welfare.    
Based on the UK law, my action will be considered Section 20 Assault; therefore considered “guilty of a Misdemeanor, and being convicted thereof shall be liable, at the Discretion of the Court, to be kept in Penal Servitude for the Term of Three Years, or to be imprisoned for any Term not exceeding Two Years, with or without Hard Labour” (Offences Against the Person Act 1861).

^{(B: abuse to animal - I kicked a stray cat out of curiosity, and broke her leg. )}

In this case, Animal Rights protect the cat’s welfare.

Based on the UK law, I have committed offense by causing the animal’s “unnecessary suffering”, therefore “shall be liable on summary conviction to— (a) imprisonment for a term not exceeding 51 weeks, or (b) a fine not exceeding £20,000, or to both” (Animal Welfare Act 2006).

^{(C: abuse to someone’s object - I broke one of Panka’s chair’s legs, out of curiosity.)}

In this case, the abused object is Panka’s property, so Human Rights protect Panka’s welfare.

Since my act of destruction was deliberate, it would be considered “offence” based on the UK law; therefore “on conviction on indictment be liable to imprisonment for life” (Criminal Damage Act 1971).

(D: abuse to own object - I broke one of my own chair’s legs out of curiosity.)

In this case, the abused object is my own property, therefore no rights protect it*.  

No one had intentionally been hurt nor threatened of harm; so I am not accused of any crime or offense.

*Human Rights apply to myself, who is the owner of the object; but it doesn’t need to be considered in this situation, since I am not the victim.

[1] Justification of the Law

Law is originally designed to protect life, which is perceived as a “counterpart of a power that threatens death” (Agamben, Means Without End 5). Then based on the values of the “common life” (Agamben, The Highest Poverty 11), rules ethically outline “[zones] of undecidability with respect to life” (Agamben, The Highest Poverty 26). In short, law intends to protect humans’ safety and welfare through the assumed average moral standards. Accordingly, I am punished for threatening Cherrie’s safety in Case A.

Case B then displays that law not only protects humans, but animals too. In the context of the UK, the Animal Welfare Act 2006 outlines the humans’ responsibility in considering vertebrates’ welfare and safety by mainly avoiding them experiencing “unnecessary suffering” (“Animal Welfare”). Due to the nature of the law to facilitate human life, most rules direct the treatment of pets, farm-animals, and traded animals; but through the contemporary understanding of ethics, rights now also apply on pests*. For instance, the “Action Plan for Animal Welfare” restricts the usage of glue traps, considering them unethical to use on rats and other pest animals (17-18). With the broad understanding that pests are just as emotionally sensitive as the other beneficial animals, it is empathy that legally protects the pests’ welfare. In fact, the general structure of Animal Rights is deeply reliant on the human empathy for animals. Case B is especially controversy because of the cruelty played on the cat, and therefore the assumed suffering the cat may have experienced.

As seen in Cases C and D, law does not protect chairs when they are abused in the same way as Cherrie and the cat in the earlier cases. The aggriever is punished in Case C, but this is in favor of the owner of the chair— which still ignores the torture the chair itself has faced directly. Although being so beneficial to human lives, the chair fails to attain enough empathy to be protected legally. This is simply because the emotional sensitivity of objects have not been scientifically observed, therefore assumed that doesn’t exist. It is scientifically appropriate, ethically sensible, and legally fair that the chair itself’s disadvantage is excluded from consideration in Cases C and D.

[3] The Flaws

In discussing objects’ rights, the most major flaw of the current legislation system is its reliability of the evaluation of emotional sensitivity. The Animal Welfare Act 2006 limits its applicability to vertebrates; assuming with scientific backup that invertebrates do not feel; but some recent scientific research in 2017 shows that “emotion-like [states]” were observed in bumblebees’ behavior (Barrachi et al, 3). It may be rather too early to conclude that only vertebrates are capable of suffering.     In fact, the very assumption that something does not exist because it is not observed, is not correct in the law of mathematics either.

In the case where the conditional statement is “If A could be observed, A exists”: the inverse statement is “if A could not be observed, A does not exist”; the converse statement is “if A exists, A could not be observed”; the contrapositive statement is “if A does not exist, A could not be observed”. If the conditional statement could be proved true— let’s say it is, or else it will challenge the basic law of physics— the contrapositive statement can automatically be proved true as well. So, by saying “If A could be observed, A exists”, it is fair to conclude that “If A does not exist, A could not be observed”. On the other hand, the law of mathematics clearly outlines that the proof of the conditional statement cannot prove the inverse and converse statement to be true too. It would require a separate mathematical proof. Therefore the statement “if A could not be observed, A does not exist” cannot be concluded neither true nor false from the conditional “If A could be observed, A exists.”

With its fatal flaw in the mathematical logic, the current legislation reveals a dangerously segregational system where the ability of communication directly affects the evaluation of emotional sensitivity. Agamben points out that “any communication […] is first if all communication not of something in common but of communicability itself” (Means without End 10). Being unable to observe any proof of emotional sensitivity in objects only reveals the fact that objects have no ability to communicate their emotions to humans. It is utterly dangerous to exclude objects from the consideration of rights, if it is essentially their communication ability that disadvantages their rights.

As a matter of fact, many philosophical and spiritual ideologies strongly imply the existence of objects’ emotions.

Nagel explains the “subjective character of experience” in his article “What is it Like to Be a Bat?” (436). For example, an objective and reductionist explanation of the “bimolecular substrate on the taste buds, which a human eater interprets via a set fo neurological receptors” fails to define the “experience of sweetness” of a piece of snack cake (Bogost, 62). Similarly, humans fail to understand the experience of echolocation as a bat, although its physical principles are scientifically explained. Without the same sensory system, the bats’ echolocation is a complete “alien experience” to humans; but of course, it is something that exists, and functions in the bats’ bodies (Bogost, 66). Alien Phenomenology addresses the alien nature of the experience as alien as it is, but also approves the existence of such non-understandable things. Accordingly, objects’ emotions can theoretically exist, only that they are indeed alien experiences from our perception, therefore never possible to understand— or ever observe through the human-made technology and logic.

Ōmori’s philosophical ideology approves interpretation as reality. In the Ōmori Philosophy, when memories of objects, interpreted imagery of sceneries, and told stories are thought in someone’s mind, they “Tachi-Awarareru [appear as manifest]” in front of the person (Ōmori, 175-179). The ‘Tachi-Aware’ of thoughts are as real as objects physically appearing in someone’s vision. In the first place, all of the emotional sensitivity that animals are known to possess, are all human interpretations of the human-like behaviors (Ōmori, 125-148). As long as any quality of the objects can be interpreted as emotion-like, there is legitimate reality in the objects’ emotional sensitivity.

Shintoism is an example of a religious ideology that more directly believes that objects clearly have emotional sensitivity. More precisely, all beings; humans, mammals, rice grains, and cups; equally have potential “kami”, in other words spirits*, inside (Ono and Woodward, 6). Although they would not always curse people for punishment, the object “kami” are believed to feel and remember both care and abuse it has experienced.

[4] Proposal

[ Purpose ]

The flaws of the UK legislation structure in its failure to consider Object Rights is utterly concerning. It is also clear that the current situation roots from the lack of empathy, unfairly caused by the objects’ inability to communicate their emotions in a commonly human-like way.

This design attacks the current ethical inconsideration of objects by stimulating people to re-evaluate the objects’ emotional sensitivity.

[ Method ]

The design ‘voices’ the object by giving it a method of communication that is shared with humans; therefore communicable with people.

To do this, the design adds a subtle human ‘emotion-like’ behavior to an object. The behavior triggers people’s realization to the possibility that the object may have feelings; and after all, any object may have always had emotional sensitivity, only that no one had ever realized.

The design should also be applied to an ordinary, though well-recognized public object, since a strange behavior in a personal object may risk people into thinking that the miracle occurred especially for them. It is unintended for the viewer to conclude that their objects have attained a special power, or that it is their personal bonding with the object that made the communication possible.

[ Main Features ]

The Gazing Clock in Waterloo Station.

When the Clock detects a person staying in the same place for over 3 seconds— most likely comparing the current time and the slowly-updating transport information— the Clock turns around to ‘look at’ the person. (=One of the Clock’s surfaces turn to the direction of the person.) When the person moves from the spot, the Clock would look away.* (=The Clock returns to its original position.)

Ideally, this creates a phenomenon where the Clock ‘looks back’ at the person’s stare; which is usually unilateral from the humans’ side.     The Clock does not give a clear facial expression, nor make any noises that can be directly interpreted into specific emotions. Therefore the viewer is forced into pausing and thinking what the Clock is saying through its mysterious stare. This slight delay facilitates the people into thinking more deeply about its emotional sensitivity.

*Even if the person moves before the Clock finishes turning to the intended direction, the Clock will finish its movement anyways, and stay in position for 1 second. Then it would ‘look away’, and turn back into the usual position. It is more important that the Clock’s movement creates a temporary gaze, than it succeeding to chase the person. *If there are multiple people pausing near the Clock, it will look at the first person detected.

[ Target ]

People who use the Waterloo Station regularly, and have a certain level of familiarity with the Waterloo Station clock. It works better on a regular commuter/ shopper than on a tourist; since the sudden active gaze from the surely passive ‘object’ can cause a stronger emotional impact.

Consequences

Risk α: The Clock becoming a site-seeing spot.

If the Clock becomes too famous for its peculiar behavior of the gaze, it may transform into a form of human entertainment. The Waterloo Station Clock specifically becoming known for its emotions; or in the worst case, known for its ‘interestingly human-like robotics’; would prevent viewers from considering the possibilities of the other objects’ emotional sensitivity.

It may be necessary to control the length of installation, or the frequency of activating the Clock’s behaviors. The fact that the Clock is a product of a design project, need to be kept secret. The ideal level of recognition of the Clock is to become a well-known local rumor that the “Waterloo Clock might have emotions”, and produce a few Internet articles related to the Clock.

This may require several additional research and experimentation in order to figure out the perfect balance of secrecy and recognition in advance.

Risk β: Paranoia— or Ironoia

As Ian Bogost identifies as “ironoia”, the “mistrust of things”, people may fall into paranoia after being suddenly exposed to the new understanding of objects’ emotional sensitivity (Harman, 225). The emotional effect of this design is unknown, therefore requires multiple prototype attempts to install this Clock. If the experience causes people’s unnecessary suffering, the design needs to be adjusted into a more humane method.

Next Step

The practical effect this piece of design can directly execute on to the current UK legislation system is unfortunately very little. After successfully influencing the Waterloo Station commuters’ thoughts, designs of the same purpose and method must be dispersed all over the United Kingdom. Then another design could be introduced to more directly addresses the necessity of Object Rights.

This design only symbolizes the beginning of the Design-Led Action— we must keep turning its gears until the Clock strikes the new era of the Object Rights Act.

Works Cited 

Publicated version: