He is one of my favorite actors which is why I tried to watch him play Arthur Rimbaud in Total Eclipse. I got about half way through and had to stop. His acting wasn't the problem, but the character he played was so annoying and pointless. I read on his wikipedia page that he is going on vacation from acting to save the planet, so you might get to watch him plant a garden some day soon.
I think a computer would have a better chance of gaining human-like consciousness if it were constructed from biological materials, cells, natural proteins, and so forth. I don't think the current materials used for computers have a good chance of achieving artifiical intelligence. This isn't a rigorously defended opinion but I would defend the unlikelihood of creating artifiical intelligence, especially out of metal and polymers, when you don't even understand "natural" intelligence and how biologic materials give rise to life is still mysterious. Once we understand biology we will have a better shot at creating synthetic life, if this is even a rational or possible aim.
But if it did happen that the computer came to be volitional in the same sense a human is, and it could take care of itself completely so was an independent entity, you would have to treat it just like anything else which falls in that category (currently only humans). I would give some leniency to the first man to encounter such a computer and what he decided to do, probably based on his inability to tell whether it was truly self aware or whether a sophisticated and deterministic program was operating.
bioengine got a reaction from Harrison Danneskjold in Thought experiment; just for fun