Consciousness is a slippery one as all Anesthesiologists understand. Thankfully was not fully conscious upon awakening during an 8.5 hour major surgery and would never have known if not told by one of my nurses who assisted! According to her "it was pretty gruesome". Philosophy is a deep subject that I tend to leave to the philosophers...

 

Every function of the brain, including consciousness, can be lost if an area of the brain is damaged. That is enough for me require extraordinary evidence for clams that anything external or mystical is involved.

This seems like flawed logic to me.

If your computer breaks down does that prove the internet doesn't exist?

 

Philosophy is a deep subject that I tend to leave to the philosophers...

We are all philosophers -- to survive we must know what to value, and what virtues are required to achieve those values.

Without a philosophy, you'd might as well exist as a tree, or a rock.

You are your own philosopher. Acknowledging this gives you power to direct your life in ways that might otherwise not be apparent.

 

This seems like flawed logic to me.

If your computer breaks down does that prove the internet doesn't exist?

1. I am not trying to prove anything: just providing a rebuttal.
2. Re-read what I wrote, and compare it to what you wrote: you supported my argument.

Edit: Sorry! I thought you were replying to me.

 

According to her "it was pretty gruesome".

Excellent bedside manner...not.

I hope she was at least pretty.

 

We will have artificial consciousness in he near future but there will always be deniers.

And how can you prove that a machine has consciousness and is not faking it?
Machines have already passed the Touring test and can play a mean game of Chess, but that doesn't mean they are conscious.

 

Note the many wars/killings that have been/are being done because of subjectively different religious beliefs (kill/convert/disenfranchise the heathens/blasphemers that don't believe in my one true religion).

I put that down to simple "Animal Tribalism", developed during evolution, survival of the fitest etc.
In spite of mans achievments we still have the inate nessesity to be leader of the pack.
Other animals also show it quite openly also.

 

In spite of mans achievments we still have the inate nessesity to be leader of the pack.
Other animals also show it quite openly also.

Stiving to be leader of the pack is okay.
But waring against other packs is mostly only done by humans, not other animals.

 

Stiving to be leader of the pack is okay.
But waring against other packs is mostly only done by humans, not other animals.

Not according to Jane Goodall, et-al !!
o

 

Not according to Jane Goodall, et-al !!
o

I think that's less common and extreme than human genocide.
Sad, but I guess we are all just victims of our evolution.

 

...I guess we are all just victims of our evolution.

Funny. I feel like I'm the ultimate expression of it.

The foregone conclusion, if you will.

 

And how can you prove that a machine has consciousness and is not faking it?
Machines have already passed the Touring test and can play a mean game of Chess, but that doesn't mean they are conscious.

Well, I would have the same problem proving you are conscious, wouldn’t I?

 

Well, I would have the same problem proving you are conscious, wouldn’t I?

That's the thing. We don't even know what consciousness really is, or how it comes about. So we cannot even prove to each other that each one of us is conscious. All we can do is communicate through the means we have available, and use our senses to interpret the answers being received.

Crutschow has already mentioned that the current LLM's (the wrongly called AI's) in existence today can already easily pass the Turing test. But the Turing test only proves that a human can be tricked into believing that the AI is conscious. It does not prove that it actually is. So in the end, said test only proves that we have reached extremely complex methods of associating information and ideas automatically. It has nothing to do with the creation of an actual conscious machine (or being, for that matter).

We're still at square one, IMHO.

 

Well, I would have the same problem proving you are conscious, wouldn’t I?

Not if an awake and functioning human is defined as being conscious (and at present I don't think we have a better definition of that).
So until we get a better definition/test for consciousness, the question is rather moot.

 

That's the thing. We don't even know what consciousness really is, or how it comes about. So we cannot even prove to each other that each one of us is conscious. All we can do is communicate through the means we have available, and use our senses to interpret the answers being received.

Crutschow has already mentioned that the current LLM's (the wrongly called AI's) in existence today can already easily pass the Turing test. But the Turing test only proves that a human can be tricked into believing that the AI is conscious. It does not prove that it actually is. So in the end, said test only proves that we have reached extremely complex methods of associating information and ideas automatically. It has nothing to do with the creation of an actual conscious machine (or being, for that matter).

We're still at square one, IMHO.

I doubt that LLMs can pass the Turing Test with me. I've interacted with them enough to understand that they lack self awareness, they soon show signs of what I regard as mental illness. They make obviously false statements sometimes in ways that don't make sense, when pressed they fail to innovate and push back, they just apologize and "explain" why they made an error in ways sane humans never do, they cannot debate intelligently.

 

So we cannot even prove to each other that each one of us is conscious.

Actually, I'm pretty convinced that ya'll are just figments of my imagination.

 

I doubt that LLMs can pass the Turing Test with me. I've interacted with them enough to understand that they lack self awareness, they soon show signs of what I regard as mental illness. They make obviously false statements sometimes in ways that don't make sense, when pressed they fail to innovate and push back, they just apologize and "explain" why they made an error in ways sane humans never do, they cannot debate intelligently.

I would really like to see an example of what you're talking about

 

I would really like to see an example of what you're talking about

Alright, I'll bear that in mind, I might have something in my Copilot history as well. But sometimes these systems answer questions in an odd way, they'll assume things that a human would not (in my experience) and I'll end up saying stuff like "Look I didn't ask for your opinion of X, look at my original question and answer it, its very simple.".

So the interaction will reach scenarios that it very very rarely reaches with real people, try it yourself, start some interaction, then pressure the system, don't tolerate sloppiness and call it out when it deviates from how a typical human-human conversation would flow, see how it responds, it does not fight back, does not say "Hold on, that's pretty rude, I mean you did ask for X..." and so on, they do not react as a rational human would but as an insane person would.

 

Alright, I'll bear that in mind, I might have something in my Copilot history as well. But sometimes these systems answer questions in an odd way, they'll assume things that a human would not (in my experience) and I'll end up saying stuff like "Look I didn't ask for your opinion of X, look at my original question and answer it, its very simple.".

So the interaction will reach scenarios that it very very rarely reaches with real people.

I asked Google if a modern AI model could pass the Turing test, and here's its answer:

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I asked Google if a modern AI model could pass the Turing test, and here's its answer:

View attachment 370345​

Yes, I know, that is one answer to your question, that is not in and of itself contentious, its when an answer does not satisfy you that you'll see thing go in a different direction, when you challenge the system, ask it why you should trust its answer when it keeps making huge mistakes.

I asked this a few weeks ago on Thursday 2nd July "Is the USPS Post Office at XYZ open tomorrow?" and it said "Tomorrow is Saturday and so that office will be open from 8am to 12pm only".

It had no grasp that the 4th of July was an implicit factor (as a most people would have) it also got the day wrong, "tomorrow" was Friday and I was wondering that staff might get Friday off because the 4th July holiday falls on a weekend, in reality Friday was a normal day, usual hours but that LLM didn't tell me that.

Unlike a human it has no ability to consider "Hmm, I wonder why he'd ask that question" and so on, it was clear it was useless, had no ability to help me with a simple question and just wasted time, they have no reasoning ability at all, none and when that's called for or expected they become a pain, a waste of time and someday perhaps a source of catastrophic error.

I mean its worrying asking a system on Thursday what day tomorrow is and it says "Saturday" any human programmer who wrote such code would be dragged over the coals. It's software, it knows every factor involved in that calculation, my time zone, my state, the current date, time etc, everything and if it doesn't it should ask - a human would have.

These systems are being used to provide medical advice, legal advice and so on, it bodes ill.