Do you think AI is, or could become, conscious?
I think AI might one day emulate consciousness to a high level of accuracy, but that wouldn’t mean it would actually be conscious.
This article mentions a Google engineer who “argued that AI chatbots could feel things and potentially suffer”. But surely in order to “feel things” you would need a nervous system right? When you feel pain from touching something very hot, it’s your nerves that are sending those pain signals to your brain… right?
First, one needs to define consciousness. What I mean by it is the fact that it feels like something to be from a subjective perspective - that there is qualia to experience.
So what I hear you asking is whether it’s conceivable that it could feel like something to be an AI system. Personally, I don’t see why not - unless consciousness is substrate-dependent, meaning there’s something inherently special about biological “wetware,” i.e. brains, that can’t be replicated in silicon. I don’t think that’s the case, since both are made of matter. I highly doubt there’s consciousness in our current systems, but at some point, there very likely will be - though we’ll probably start treating them as conscious beings before they actually become such.
As for the idea of “emulated consciousness,” that doesn’t make much sense to me. Emulated consciousness is real consciousness. It’s kind of like bravery - you can’t fake it. Acting brave despite being scared is bravery.
You’re getting downvoted but I absolutely agree. I don’t understand why “AI algorithms are just math, therefore they can’t have consciousness” seems to be the predominant view even among people interested in the topic. I haven’t heard a single convincing argument why “math” is fundamentally different from human brains. Sure, current AI is way less complex and doesn’t have a continuous stream of perceptual input. But that’s something a “proper” humanoid robot would need to have, and processing power will increase as well.
lmao. How about an anti-matter “AI”? Dark matter? Any other options for physical materials?