3 ms·

Kind of off topic from the article, but here’s another scenario to add to the AI Risk conversation: Sentience (along with consciousness, sapience, and qualia)

by jl6 4y ago

Kind of off topic from the article, but here’s another scenario to add to the AI Risk conversation: Sentience (along with consciousness, sapience, and qualia) turns out to be undefinable woo, leading to a declaration that AI is not sentient and neither are humans, and so rather than treating machines like people, we end up treating people like machines. Yeah, yeah, we already do treat people like machines etc. etc., but we risk further dehumanization if we decide the human mind is nothing special after all.

telmo 4y ago
I find that the term "woo" suffered a semantic drift in the last few decades. It used to refer to things that pretend to be scientific by using the terminology and aesthetics of science without being grounded in real empiricism. One classical example of "real woo" is homeopathy. Nowadays, "woo" is being applied to anything that science cannot model or explain. Science cannot explain consciousness? Well it must be woo then! You tell me that you experience your own consciousness, and that you are sure it exists? No, it's an illusion my poor child. An illusion of whom, you ask? That is starting to sound like philosophy, which is not science so it must be woo. Careful. Woo is becoming synonymous with "heretic" and "science" no longer means what I thought it meant. In my view, the defining aspects of science, the ones that make it such a splendorous endeavor, are modesty and doubt. All scientific theories are under the permanent risk of being falsified, otherwise they are not serious theories. There are many things we do not understand, and it might even be that this will always be the case. Some things defy our current understanding or reality, and consciousness is one of them. That doesn't make it woo, and those that pretend that it does are like the fearful religious people of previous ages, as they shout "woo"/"heretic" at those who have the temerity of harboring doubts and questions.

by jl6 4y ago

telmo 4y ago

I find that the term "woo" suffered a semantic drift in the last few decades. It used to refer to things that pretend to be scientific by using the terminology and aesthetics of science without being grounded in real empiricism. One classical example of "real woo" is homeopathy. Nowadays, "woo" is being applied to anything that science cannot model or explain. Science cannot explain consciousness? Well it must be woo then! You tell me that you experience your own consciousness, and that you are sure it exists? No, it's an illusion my poor child. An illusion of whom, you ask? That is starting to sound like philosophy, which is not science so it must be woo. Careful. Woo is becoming synonymous with "heretic" and "science" no longer means what I thought it meant. In my view, the defining aspects of science, the ones that make it such a splendorous endeavor, are modesty and doubt. All scientific theories are under the permanent risk of being falsified, otherwise they are not serious theories. There are many things we do not understand, and it might even be that this will always be the case. Some things defy our current understanding or reality, and consciousness is one of them. That doesn't make it woo, and those that pretend that it does are like the fearful religious people of previous ages, as they shout "woo"/"heretic" at those who have the temerity of harboring doubts and questions.