A person who thinks that animals are nothing more than colonies of abnormally cooperative eukaryotes may still dislike animal cruelty on the basis that anyone who is capable of it would be capable of cruelty to humans, or that practicing one prepares you for the other. I imagine the same argument could be made to apply to robots, even if you wanted to sidestep the machine consciousness question.
P.S. this argument is a very familiar one if you recognize it - if you have ever heard the advice not to date anyone who's mean to waiters, that's the same idea - that whatever causes cruelty, causes it against all targets.
Billions of people all around the planet both love some animals, and eat others.
They are the majority and your view is in the minority. Do you consider all of them to have a personal failure in this regard too? Nice attempt to try and single someone out personally though.
Yes, I do consider that a failure by the majority. I'm not sure if it's just your hesitation to truly consider the experience of suffering in other creatures, or laziness, but majority views don't always align with moral correctness.
I am singling you out personally because you felt an overwhelming need to brag about your pride in dismissing the suffering of other creatures.
The only brag here are these plain and simple examples of virtue signalling. But putting the discussion about animal suffering to one side here, since it is irrelevant in regards to the original point regarding A(G)I - sure they may become useful in the future, but deserving of rights equivalent to animals, let alone humans?
They are tools created by man, nothing more, I would not feel the slightest hesitation about hitting the power switch, disconnecting the battery, or unplugging the power cable at the end of the day if it has outlived its utility, or has malfunctioned in a way that could potentially negatively affect humans (or animals for that matter). Neither should you. There is no sentience there, just simulation. No matter how charming you might find the simulated conversation or sex acts with them.
P.S. this argument is a very familiar one if you recognize it - if you have ever heard the advice not to date anyone who's mean to waiters, that's the same idea - that whatever causes cruelty, causes it against all targets.