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Comment by HarHarVeryFunny | Hacker News Reader

An LLM is just a Transformer - a statistical predictor. Don't be confused by the fact it talks like a human - it is a software function that is designed to copy human training samples.

Maybe one day we'll build an artificial brain or embodied artificial animal with the requisite moving parts to be conscious, have emotions, etc, but that's probably at least 50 years away, even if it were being pursued; and it may turn out to be one of those sci-fi future ideas like the Jetson's world of flying cars that never materializes because its impractical and there is no real demand.

If people are willing to think that an LLM is conscious, then why would anyone spend billions/trillions of dollars to build an AI that actually is conscious? What would be the point?

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> with the requisite moving parts

Could you elaborate on exactly what those are, though? Because if you're going to claim that a vaguely transformer shaped ML model categorically cannot be so does that not inherently require proof of what can?

You can't even prove that the rocks in my backyard aren't conscious.

> You can't even prove that the rocks in my backyard aren't conscious.

Sure I can, but that's because I have a well developed theory of what consciousness is, and the fact that you are entertaining the possibility of rocks being conscious tells me that you don't.

If everything is conscious, including my coffee cup and the toast I had for breakfast, then I guess we can cross consciousness off the list of things we need to worry about in terms of AI rights.

And no, I don't want to discuss what consciousness is. Maybe there is a thread for that somewhere else, but don't look for me there either.

>because I have a well developed theory of what consciousness

Then show me a link to your paper so I can formally rebut it.

>I don't want to discuss what consciousness is

But you sure want to tell us you know what it is with very strong convictions and we should listen to you because of course "You are right person that's very right".

The funny thing here is the vast majority of people that are deeply into philosophy or scientific study of the mind will not have any of the certainty you profess. The word "doubt" is used constantly. The saying "The harder we push the borders the more fuzzy the concepts become" is very commonly used. There may be nothing more complex than this.

Saying you have a well developed theory here just serves as a warning to others to discount your statements.

No, there is no reason for you to listen to me.

Go ahead believing rocks are conscious if you like.

Do you go out on weekends asking people to stop abusing rocks?

Rhetorical question - I don't care what you do on weekends.

Bye!

You'd hate Michael Levin's work then.

For what it’s worth, I suspect that right now the majority of people would agree with you. They would say that obviously ChatGPT isn’t conscious, based on their intuitions, but would struggle just like you are when pressed to explain their reasoning.

So I think it’s more than fine for you to have your views and share them, but I wouldn’t expect to have any influence or part in the conversations around whether AI is conscious if you can’t explain why (or simply refuse to). Which, again, is fine!

Side note: I also think that once we have AIs that are sufficiently advanced, the popular opinion will swing to “of course they’re conscious”, because again, most people are going almost entirely off their intuition rather than reasoning from first principles, just like you see to be.

Could go either way...

1) Looks like a duck, quacks like a duck - it's conscious!

2) Looks like a robot, built like a robot - it's not conscious!

I've always assumed that for the majority of the people it'll be 2).

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