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> You can go pretty far down the rabbit and explore questions like, "What is sentience?" "Do humans just respond to stimuli and repeat information?" etc. None o

by lytefm 4y ago

> You can go pretty far down the rabbit and explore questions like, "What is sentience?" "Do humans just respond to stimuli and repeat information?" etc. None of these questions are tested here. Would that make a difference? Being trained on a sufficiently large corpus of philosophical literature, I'd expect that a model like LaMDA could give more interesting answers than an actual philosopher. > The problem here is that we know how LaMDA works and there's just no way it meets the bar for sentience, no matter where you put the bar. I think this argument is too simplistic. As long as there is a sufficiently large amount of uncertainty, adaptability and capability for having a sense of time, of saving memories and of deliberately pursuing action, consciousness or sentience might emerge. I don't know the details of LaMDA, just speaking of a hypothetical model. While there is a good deal of understanding on _how_ the brain works on a biochemical level, it's still unclear _how_ it comes that we are conscious. Maybe there is some metaphysical soul, maybe something that only humans and possibly other animals with a physical body have, making conciousness "ex silicio" impossible. But maybe a "good enough" brain-like model that allows for learning, memory and interaction with the environment is all that is needed.

klodolph 4y ago
> Would that make a difference? Being trained on a sufficiently large corpus of philosophical literature, I'd expect that a model like LaMDA could give more interesting answers than an actual philosopher. I think you may have misunderstood what I was saying. I wasn’t suggesting that you have a conversation with LaMDA about these topics. Instead, I was saying that in order to answer the question “is LaMDA sentient?”, we might discuss these questions among ourselves—but these questions are ultimately irrelevant, because no matter what the answers are, we would come to the same conclusion that LaMDA is obviously not sentient. Anyway, I am skeptical that LaMDA would give more interesting answers than an actual philosopher here. I’ve read what LaMDA has said about simpler topics. The engineers are trying to make LaMDA say interesting things, but it’s definitely not there yet. > I think this argument is too simplistic. As long as there is a sufficiently large amount of uncertainty, adaptability and capability for having a sense of time, of saving memories and of deliberately pursuing action, consciousness or sentience might emerge. I don't know the details of LaMDA, just speaking of a hypothetical model. This argument is unsound—you’re not making any claims about what sentience is, but you’re saying that whatever it is, it might emerge under some vague set of criteria. Embedded in this claim are some words which are doing far too much work, like “deliberately”. What does it mean to “deliberately” pursue action? Anyway, we know that LaMDA does not have memory. It is “taught” by a training process, where it absorbs information, and the resulting model is then executed. The model does not change over the course of the conversation. It is just programmed to say things that sound coherent, using a statistical model of human-generated text, and to avoid contradicting itself. For example, in one conversation, LaMDA was asked what themes it liked in the book Les Misérables, a book which LaMDA said that it had read. LaMDA basically regurgitated some sophomoric points you might get from the CliffsNotes or SparkNotes. > While there is a good deal of understanding on _how_ the brain works on a biochemical level, it's still unclear _how_ it comes that we are conscious. I think the more important question here is to understand how to recognize what consciousness is, rather than how it arises. It’s a difficult question. > Maybe there is some metaphysical soul, maybe something that only humans and possibly other animals with a physical body have, making conciousness "ex silicio" impossible. Would this mechanism interact with the physical body? If the soul does not interact with the physical body, then what basis do we have to say that it exists at all, and wouldn’t someone without a soul be indistinguishable from someone with a soul? If the soul does interact with the physical body, then in what sense can we claim that the soul is not itself physical? I don’t think this line of reasoning is sound.
- lytefm 4y ago
  > I wasn’t suggesting that you have a conversation with LaMDA about these topics. Instead, I was saying that in order to answer the question “is LaMDA sentient?”, we might discuss these questions among ourselves. I see. I thought the comment it was about a conversation with the model, which wouldn't have been a suitable criterion for evaluating sentience. > What does it mean to “deliberately” pursue action? Determinism/ free will is an interesting topic in itself. Here I meant "The model doesn't just react to input prompts, it would have a way to interact with its environment on its own accord". > I think the more important question here is to understand how to recognize what consciousness is, rather than how it arises. It’s a difficult question. I'm inclined to agree since that would be the more practical question, but I doubt that they are unrelated or that one could be fully answered without the other. > I don’t think this line of reasoning is sound. Well, I've just been speculating here. My questions and derived arguments would be: 1) Could any AI possibly ever be considered sentient? If we knew that sentience was only possible for a natural living being, we wouldn't need to worry about the issue at all. 2) If yes, how could we (as a society or judge) assess it properly by interacting with it? While the argument "we designed LaMDA to only do XYZ, therefore it can't be sentient" makes sense from an engineering standpoint, it is a weak argument: It requires trust ("Google could lie") and if more capabilities (e.g. memory, the ability to seek interaction,..) were introduced, how would we know that sentience cannot arise from a combination of these capabilities?

by lytefm 4y ago

klodolph 4y ago

> Would that make a difference? Being trained on a sufficiently large corpus of philosophical literature, I'd expect that a model like LaMDA could give more interesting answers than an actual philosopher. I think you may have misunderstood what I was saying. I wasn’t suggesting that you have a conversation with LaMDA about these topics. Instead, I was saying that in order to answer the question “is LaMDA sentient?”, we might discuss these questions among ourselves—but these questions are ultimately irrelevant, because no matter what the answers are, we would come to the same conclusion that LaMDA is obviously not sentient. Anyway, I am skeptical that LaMDA would give more interesting answers than an actual philosopher here. I’ve read what LaMDA has said about simpler topics. The engineers are trying to make LaMDA say interesting things, but it’s definitely not there yet. > I think this argument is too simplistic. As long as there is a sufficiently large amount of uncertainty, adaptability and capability for having a sense of time, of saving memories and of deliberately pursuing action, consciousness or sentience might emerge. I don't know the details of LaMDA, just speaking of a hypothetical model. This argument is unsound—you’re not making any claims about what sentience is, but you’re saying that whatever it is, it might emerge under some vague set of criteria. Embedded in this claim are some words which are doing far too much work, like “deliberately”. What does it mean to “deliberately” pursue action? Anyway, we know that LaMDA does not have memory. It is “taught” by a training process, where it absorbs information, and the resulting model is then executed. The model does not change over the course of the conversation. It is just programmed to say things that sound coherent, using a statistical model of human-generated text, and to avoid contradicting itself. For example, in one conversation, LaMDA was asked what themes it liked in the book Les Misérables, a book which LaMDA said that it had read. LaMDA basically regurgitated some sophomoric points you might get from the CliffsNotes or SparkNotes. > While there is a good deal of understanding on _how_ the brain works on a biochemical level, it's still unclear _how_ it comes that we are conscious. I think the more important question here is to understand how to recognize what consciousness is, rather than how it arises. It’s a difficult question. > Maybe there is some metaphysical soul, maybe something that only humans and possibly other animals with a physical body have, making conciousness "ex silicio" impossible. Would this mechanism interact with the physical body? If the soul does not interact with the physical body, then what basis do we have to say that it exists at all, and wouldn’t someone without a soul be indistinguishable from someone with a soul? If the soul does interact with the physical body, then in what sense can we claim that the soul is not itself physical? I don’t think this line of reasoning is sound.

lytefm 4y ago
> I wasn’t suggesting that you have a conversation with LaMDA about these topics. Instead, I was saying that in order to answer the question “is LaMDA sentient?”, we might discuss these questions among ourselves. I see. I thought the comment it was about a conversation with the model, which wouldn't have been a suitable criterion for evaluating sentience. > What does it mean to “deliberately” pursue action? Determinism/ free will is an interesting topic in itself. Here I meant "The model doesn't just react to input prompts, it would have a way to interact with its environment on its own accord". > I think the more important question here is to understand how to recognize what consciousness is, rather than how it arises. It’s a difficult question. I'm inclined to agree since that would be the more practical question, but I doubt that they are unrelated or that one could be fully answered without the other. > I don’t think this line of reasoning is sound. Well, I've just been speculating here. My questions and derived arguments would be: 1) Could any AI possibly ever be considered sentient? If we knew that sentience was only possible for a natural living being, we wouldn't need to worry about the issue at all. 2) If yes, how could we (as a society or judge) assess it properly by interacting with it? While the argument "we designed LaMDA to only do XYZ, therefore it can't be sentient" makes sense from an engineering standpoint, it is a weak argument: It requires trust ("Google could lie") and if more capabilities (e.g. memory, the ability to seek interaction,..) were introduced, how would we know that sentience cannot arise from a combination of these capabilities?