Or at this point he's just an AI using his body and the real him is already death?

34 Comments

  1. battlenetwork2

    As far as we know, Adam Smasher does not harbor any AIs, or at least not any that would/could take over his body. He’s just borged out to the fucking gills.

  2. spectacularlyrubbish

    Well, this is a philosophical discussion….

    He’s still got a brain. The brain of an asshole, but a brain. He has a mind.

  3. Brilliant-Remote-405

    By this point, he was just a brain on a stick.

  4. Far-Development1468

    I personally wonder if he’s just an engram on a chip that they switch into new completely borg bodies whenever he’s due for an upgrade or gets too banged up

  5. ThyLogical

    Biologically? He is canonically 96% augmentation. He is a brain shoved into a walking tank with a partially recognizable faceplate. I think it’s safe to say that there’s almost nothing human about his body.

    Morally / psychologically? Well… was he ever?

  6. AndreiRiboli

    I’d say he’s still human because his brain is still there (as far as we know, that *is* his original brain).

  7. Rusted909

    No, technically, he is because he’s got his brain, but i think everyone would consider his far from human, and he would love that

  8. hankjw01

    What makes us human? What even is humanity? Is it having flesh and bones? Or only a brain?
    Or is it consciousness and awareness?

    Have fun with these questions, thinking about this is one of the main points of science fiction like Cyberpunk, Bladerunner or Ghost in the Shell

  9. Ucw2thebone

    That’s one of the overall themes of the game; at what point do you lose your humanity and does an A.I. with independent thought constitute a human?

  10. SV976reditAcount

    To be perfectly honest he’s more machine than men so it wouldn’t surprise me if he comes back in the sequel

  11. StillNotAPerson

    Is Theseus’s ship still his original ship if every part has been replaced over the years ?
    If yes, then Adam is still human.
    If not, then when did it stop to be ?

    Thinking thinking, philosophizing philosophizing, but no definitive answer because it depends on who you’d ask.

  12. Futur3_ah4ad

    He’s about 8% human IIRC.

    92 or 94% conversion

  13. aeturnes

    This is a philosophical question that requires us to first answer “what makes us human?”

  14. No_Proposal_3140

    If I plucked your brain out of your skull and put it in a robot, would you still consider yourself to be human? You’d need some extreme self loathing to stop considering yourself human. Yes, you’d still be human. Even a digitized psyche is still a human if it decides that it is. No one but yourself can actually decide what you are. If you still see yourself as human then you are.

    Smasher might not consider himself to be human anymore though.

  15. K1rk0npolttaja

    through my extremely biased transhumanist perspective he is something above human, but from a moral standpoint he was barely a human to begin with.

  16. Sinisphere

    We’re going to get into Ghost in the Shell territory real quick.

  17. MrSmilingDeath

    It’s kind of a Ship of Theseus scenario, huh?

  18. lawrencefishbaurne

    I mean, this conversation is kinda part of the point of the genre and game

  19. sendep7

    the same arguments could be made for L1zzy.

  20. Intrepid-Brain-1476

    He was an animal long before he got reduced to a brain in a mechanical body.

  21. ShitassAintOverYet

    First of all, with no disrespect or anything personal whatsoever, please shut up about AI. I’m too tired of that topic and the answer to your question is no.

    Adam Smasher was born human and that’s why his brain is possibly the only ever organic part of his body. But as both the lore and Cyberpunk TTRPG’s system suggests more cyberware means less humanity.

    Normally when you hit 0 humanity it’s cyberpsychosis where your body presses a panic button to overwhelm you on your emotions and memories to restore humanity but you go mentally unstable and extremely dangerous in the process. Smasher is special because his body never hits the panic button, he is numb to many emotions but still conscious and himself perhaps because there wasn’t much life, emotions or personality for him to begin with.

  22. Wainwort

    Barely, even before getting chromed up. He was just another corporate puppet dangling on ‘saka strings.

  23. Training-Equipment25

    The question is, does he still have a soul? Or is he a construct like Johnny

  24. xdeltax97

    Little more than a brain in the Jar. Basically a Cyberpunk Grievous

  25. reverse_caveman

    I 100% misread this as Adam Sandler

  26. suckitphil

    I like the fan theory that arasaka already soul ripped his ass. And now they just assemble new atom smashers using random gonk brains. 

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