I sometimes like to imagine the umwelt of an LLM. Tokens are their sensory atoms, and the statistical relationships between them form their entire reality.
Of course, one could easily build a model whose tokens line up with qualia we experience.
Of course, one could easily build a model whose tokens line up with qualia we experience.
Nobody really knows what is necessary or (let alone and) sufficient for having a what-is-it-like-to-be-ness.
Lots of us claim we know, but whenever I've asked for details, it's always been some combination of
(α) circular, e.g. "consciousness is sentience, sentience is consciousness";
(β) something that's so vague it accidentally includes VCRs because they can record information that can be recalled later;
and/or (γ) that doesn't include all humans (most often by excluding those with aphantasia and/or amnesia, but not only).
So… perhaps any given LLMs does, and perhaps it doesn't. Perhaps the structure can support qualia, but only actually gets them when the training process passes the analog of a thermodynamic phase change; or perhaps, even if that's the right general idea, qualia is a different phase change that this model can't support.
Unfortunately, I can't find that phase change analogy with a quick web search, so I'm not sure if that analogy has ever really been made before or if it was just a dream I've misfiled as a memory of reality.
Personally, I’m inclined to believe that consciousness requires an integrated attention-self-world model, but maybe not much more that that.
Thanks!