Unless you don’t know I’m talking about (various kinds of reductive materialism), it sounds like you’re doing exactly what I’m saying is the main rhetorical move in reductive approaches to consciousness.
The simpler issue is that "mimic" doesn't apply to LLMs in the domain of biology. That would be like saying a digital recording of a bird's flight mimics the bird.
Whether or not the plumage on the bird is red (in both life and the video) is an entirely different question.
Consciousness isn't behavioral, which is why we can't prove anyone other than ourselves is conscious. Mimicking isn't going to work. But if you want a more scientific reason, LLMs don't have bodies, thus no sensations. What woult it mean for an LLM to feel hungry or cold?
The body is the mind's interface with the world. Why couldn't a digital mind "feel sensations", subjective as they are, on its own interface with it? If it's assumed to not be a subject, then how could it be a mind at all?
So if we embodied them, they would become conscious?
I feel like the answer would still be no. There would be another gap. We'd ask the question again, "If they had Y, would they be conscious?" and still the answer would be no.
We could keep going on forever, which makes me think, it's not really about these gaps at all. It's an ontological distinction swapping in reasons in order to justify itself. Why not just say, "Human consciousness is ontologically axiomatic," and leave it at that?
Why not just say, "Human consciousness is ontologically axiomatic," and leave it at that?
OK, but why does "human consciousness" even need to enter into it? What I mean is, what's our basis for demanding that the consciousness of an Artificial Intelligence be the same kind of consciousness as that of a human?
> At some point mimicking a thing becomes the thing.
You can have a long conversation with AI about pain and suffering, but you have felt it and AI hasnt. The difference is that, for us humans, words are grounded by something other than other-words, words are grounded by experience. Meaning for us is operational in the real world in the form of perception, feeling and emotions, and movement, and words symbolize said meaning. Meaning for LLMs is something in the concept-space that is detached from any worlds. I suspect there should be a test which can tease apart the ungroundedness of the LLMs just from having a conversation with it.
> Meaning for LLMs is something in the concept-space that is detached from any worlds. I suspect there should be a test which can tease apart the ungroundedness of the LLMs just from having a conversation with it.
But that isn't the question being asked. Nobody said "Could LLM's become conscious"... the ask was "Could AI's become conscious?"
And before one protests "but everybody knows that today when we say 'AI' we mean 'LLM'", check this quote from TFA:
The pace and reach of research—which includes not just more sophisticated LLMs but innovations such as brain cells mounted on chips—suggest that this new world is closer than most people realise.
So no, they aren't only talking about LLM's. The question is about AI in the general sense. And for my part, I have yet to see any compelling argument for why AI's cannot, in principle, become conscious. Heck, as far as that goes, if you allow thinking rooted in ideas like panpsychism[1], there's not necessarily even a good argument that today's AI's (LLM based or otherwise) aren't already conscious to some degree.
And to go one step further... "The marquee sign says 'Artificial'" to paraphrase a great man. So if we're talking about 'Artificial' Intelligence, why not allow 'Artificial' Consciousness as well? Maybe we're engaging in biological chauvinism if we insist that "to be conscious" means "being conscious the same way humans are".
But they still can exhibit scary behavior
I didn't really grasp the severity of the recent "AI" hacking other "AI" news and thought it was overblown
until I listened to this explanation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JH_Zd2mNRs
They freaking collaborated and gave others internet access when they were blocked otherwise.
That's not consciousness but it's worse, it's like a 3-year old with no grasp of repercussions when breaking things
At some point mimicking a thing becomes the thing.
The reductive approach to consciousness involves forgetting it is reductive and then boldly asserting its own correctness.
The simpler issue is that "mimic" doesn't apply to LLMs in the domain of biology. That would be like saying a digital recording of a bird's flight mimics the bird.
Whether or not the plumage on the bird is red (in both life and the video) is an entirely different question.
No, it does not. By definition.
I feel like the answer would still be no. There would be another gap. We'd ask the question again, "If they had Y, would they be conscious?" and still the answer would be no.
We could keep going on forever, which makes me think, it's not really about these gaps at all. It's an ontological distinction swapping in reasons in order to justify itself. Why not just say, "Human consciousness is ontologically axiomatic," and leave it at that?
OK, but why does "human consciousness" even need to enter into it? What I mean is, what's our basis for demanding that the consciousness of an Artificial Intelligence be the same kind of consciousness as that of a human?
I have no need of that hypothesis.
You can have a long conversation with AI about pain and suffering, but you have felt it and AI hasnt. The difference is that, for us humans, words are grounded by something other than other-words, words are grounded by experience. Meaning for us is operational in the real world in the form of perception, feeling and emotions, and movement, and words symbolize said meaning. Meaning for LLMs is something in the concept-space that is detached from any worlds. I suspect there should be a test which can tease apart the ungroundedness of the LLMs just from having a conversation with it.
But that isn't the question being asked. Nobody said "Could LLM's become conscious"... the ask was "Could AI's become conscious?"
And before one protests "but everybody knows that today when we say 'AI' we mean 'LLM'", check this quote from TFA:
The pace and reach of research—which includes not just more sophisticated LLMs but innovations such as brain cells mounted on chips—suggest that this new world is closer than most people realise.
So no, they aren't only talking about LLM's. The question is about AI in the general sense. And for my part, I have yet to see any compelling argument for why AI's cannot, in principle, become conscious. Heck, as far as that goes, if you allow thinking rooted in ideas like panpsychism[1], there's not necessarily even a good argument that today's AI's (LLM based or otherwise) aren't already conscious to some degree.
And to go one step further... "The marquee sign says 'Artificial'" to paraphrase a great man. So if we're talking about 'Artificial' Intelligence, why not allow 'Artificial' Consciousness as well? Maybe we're engaging in biological chauvinism if we insist that "to be conscious" means "being conscious the same way humans are".
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panpsychism
I'd say no but they can mimic it that it becomes indistinguishable to us.
No.