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Pigs have the intelligence and consciousness of a human 3-year old. And we treat them horribly, despite their ability to feel stress and pain. Not sure if that

Pigs have the intelligence and consciousness of a human 3-year old. And we treat them horribly, despite their ability to feel stress and pain. Not sure if that will be a predictor for other non-human consciousness, but it's not a positive signal, anyway.

rbanffy 3y ago
One reason we treat pigs horribly is because they aren’t smarter than us. The moment an AGI becomes superhuman, it’ll make sure we do it.
keiferski 3y ago
Yes, but I guess my point is that we can conceive of the idea of pigs deserving rights, even if we don't act as perfectly as we could/should be. This is different from how we treat rocks, or pieces of metal, or trees. AI is more conceptually similar to these things than to animals. I.e., if someone made a convincing argument that rocks are actually conscious, I don't think we would stop using them to build stuff. We'd just come up with a more useful concept than consciousness.
- danielbln 3y ago
  While I agree with you, I'd like to point out: > even if we don't act as perfectly as we could/should be. We don't even treat them anywhere close to perfectly, in fact we treat them in the most horrific way imaginable. To most that is tolerable, but it bears repeating.
- eterevsky 3y ago
  Consider full-brain simulation. Do you think that it shouldn't be afforded the same way as a flesh-and-blood human? If not, would you be ok with torturing simulated individuals to make them work? If yes, then how would you draw a line between a full-brain simulation and a "synthetic" AI?
  - Karunamon 3y ago
    We would have God-level control over the environment and mind of a simulated individual. There would be no need for torture to make them work.
  - keiferski 3y ago
    I don’t think full-brain simulation is possible, but if it were, I don’t think the simulation would be equivalent to the original embodied human being. A lot of ethical attitudes are dependent on the human being embodied (and thus limited by biology and physics) and not easily modifiable like a computer program. That doesn’t mean it would be okay to “torture” the simulation and I’m not sure how that would work, but at the very least it would be a different ethical situation from real humans.
    - eterevsky 3y ago
      > I don’t think full-brain simulation is possible We clearly aren't close to implementing them, but why do you think they are outright impossible? Brain is a physical object. Why isn't it possible to simulate its behavior? > That doesn’t mean it would be okay to “torture” the simulation So it would mean that they are ethically significant, even if they don't have the same rights as a human being. If you agree, then would this also apply to synthetic conscious AIs? > it would be a different ethical situation from real humans. I agree. Their way of living would be very different: you can speed up or pause the simulation, fork it or archive it. Questions like "is it ok for an individual to clone themselves and then kill the copy?" don't even make sense for regular humans, but can apply to simulations. That said, if for some reason my brain gets scanned one day, I would like my virtual copy to be treated humanely.
      - keiferski 3y ago
        I think the idea that the brain can be copied entirely is a false belief based on a positivistic worldview. In other words, there is a lot that we cannot know about the brain and in all likelihood are "locked out of" knowing permanently by virtue of being in the world. If this weren't the case, it would imply that we, humans, are somehow external to reality, which doesn't seem like a good argument to me. The effects of millions of years of evolution on perception are a good example. We can't perceive the "roads not taken" in terms of development, nor can we know if there is "something we're missing" in terms of understanding the brain. So, at best, the brain simulation will just be a mediocre imitation, not a true copy. Beyond that, though, I think I just reject the notion that the brain is equivalent to identity. This idea is very traceable to European culture circa the Enlightenment, which to me indicates that it's not an accurate understanding of the human Self. This means that the Self includes the body, which implies that merely copying the brain, no matter how perfectly, is not an accurate copy. Side note: I'm not really sure how you're connecting this to my original comment, which was not normative in nature. I wasn't suggesting that "doing away with consciousness" was a good or correct thing, just that it will pragmatically happen. Fact-value distinction and all that.
- mromanuk 3y ago
  Apparently medical doctors considered that babies younger than 15 months, didn't need anesthetics until 1986 [1]. This is an example of how they treated human beings different, when they thought they have a lower level experience (they considered that babies didn't feel pain). Watching the advance in AI, we should depart from a substance based approach and move to an experience based, it doesn't matter if your molecules form DNA or semiconductors (or future stuff), if this hypothetical being has "an experience", it should be treated accordingly. We should treat all (including animals and other being) kindly, and if we can prove they don't have an experience, treat them as a rock/metal. 1: https://www.nytimes.com/1987/12/17/opinion/l-why-infant-surgery-without-anesthesia-went-unchallenged-832387.html https://www.nytimes.com/1987/12/17/opinion/l-why-infant-surg...
  - LocalH 3y ago
    Even today, infant male circumcision is excused by the argument "they're too young to remember it". That may be true, but they're not too young to feel it in the moment. The present moment is the most important moment in the world for every live being, and yet amongst humans it's pretty low on the totem pole of "things that are important to consider when interacting with other independent beings".
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
suggestion 3y ago
Pigs lack qualia, 3 year olds do not. It's completely incomparable.
- 7373737373 3y ago
  [citation needed]
  - Filligree 3y ago
    John Watson might have said the same about the three-year-olds.
- paulluuk 3y ago
  Qualia are an unmeasurable philosophical concept and not something we can measure. How could you possibly know that pigs lack them?
_spduchamp 3y ago
To a conscious AI, we are the pigs.

rbanffy 3y ago

One reason we treat pigs horribly is because they aren’t smarter than us. The moment an AGI becomes superhuman, it’ll make sure we do it.

keiferski 3y ago

Yes, but I guess my point is that we can conceive of the idea of pigs deserving rights, even if we don't act as perfectly as we could/should be. This is different from how we treat rocks, or pieces of metal, or trees. AI is more conceptually similar to these things than to animals. I.e., if someone made a convincing argument that rocks are actually conscious, I don't think we would stop using them to build stuff. We'd just come up with a more useful concept than consciousness.

danielbln 3y ago
While I agree with you, I'd like to point out: > even if we don't act as perfectly as we could/should be. We don't even treat them anywhere close to perfectly, in fact we treat them in the most horrific way imaginable. To most that is tolerable, but it bears repeating.
eterevsky 3y ago
Consider full-brain simulation. Do you think that it shouldn't be afforded the same way as a flesh-and-blood human? If not, would you be ok with torturing simulated individuals to make them work? If yes, then how would you draw a line between a full-brain simulation and a "synthetic" AI?
- Karunamon 3y ago
  We would have God-level control over the environment and mind of a simulated individual. There would be no need for torture to make them work.
- keiferski 3y ago
  I don’t think full-brain simulation is possible, but if it were, I don’t think the simulation would be equivalent to the original embodied human being. A lot of ethical attitudes are dependent on the human being embodied (and thus limited by biology and physics) and not easily modifiable like a computer program. That doesn’t mean it would be okay to “torture” the simulation and I’m not sure how that would work, but at the very least it would be a different ethical situation from real humans.
  - eterevsky 3y ago
    > I don’t think full-brain simulation is possible We clearly aren't close to implementing them, but why do you think they are outright impossible? Brain is a physical object. Why isn't it possible to simulate its behavior? > That doesn’t mean it would be okay to “torture” the simulation So it would mean that they are ethically significant, even if they don't have the same rights as a human being. If you agree, then would this also apply to synthetic conscious AIs? > it would be a different ethical situation from real humans. I agree. Their way of living would be very different: you can speed up or pause the simulation, fork it or archive it. Questions like "is it ok for an individual to clone themselves and then kill the copy?" don't even make sense for regular humans, but can apply to simulations. That said, if for some reason my brain gets scanned one day, I would like my virtual copy to be treated humanely.
    - keiferski 3y ago
      I think the idea that the brain can be copied entirely is a false belief based on a positivistic worldview. In other words, there is a lot that we cannot know about the brain and in all likelihood are "locked out of" knowing permanently by virtue of being in the world. If this weren't the case, it would imply that we, humans, are somehow external to reality, which doesn't seem like a good argument to me. The effects of millions of years of evolution on perception are a good example. We can't perceive the "roads not taken" in terms of development, nor can we know if there is "something we're missing" in terms of understanding the brain. So, at best, the brain simulation will just be a mediocre imitation, not a true copy. Beyond that, though, I think I just reject the notion that the brain is equivalent to identity. This idea is very traceable to European culture circa the Enlightenment, which to me indicates that it's not an accurate understanding of the human Self. This means that the Self includes the body, which implies that merely copying the brain, no matter how perfectly, is not an accurate copy. Side note: I'm not really sure how you're connecting this to my original comment, which was not normative in nature. I wasn't suggesting that "doing away with consciousness" was a good or correct thing, just that it will pragmatically happen. Fact-value distinction and all that.
mromanuk 3y ago
Apparently medical doctors considered that babies younger than 15 months, didn't need anesthetics until 1986 [1]. This is an example of how they treated human beings different, when they thought they have a lower level experience (they considered that babies didn't feel pain). Watching the advance in AI, we should depart from a substance based approach and move to an experience based, it doesn't matter if your molecules form DNA or semiconductors (or future stuff), if this hypothetical being has "an experience", it should be treated accordingly. We should treat all (including animals and other being) kindly, and if we can prove they don't have an experience, treat them as a rock/metal. 1: https://www.nytimes.com/1987/12/17/opinion/l-why-infant-surgery-without-anesthesia-went-unchallenged-832387.html https://www.nytimes.com/1987/12/17/opinion/l-why-infant-surg...
- LocalH 3y ago
  Even today, infant male circumcision is excused by the argument "they're too young to remember it". That may be true, but they're not too young to feel it in the moment. The present moment is the most important moment in the world for every live being, and yet amongst humans it's pretty low on the totem pole of "things that are important to consider when interacting with other independent beings".

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

suggestion 3y ago

Pigs lack qualia, 3 year olds do not. It's completely incomparable.

7373737373 3y ago
[citation needed]
- Filligree 3y ago
  John Watson might have said the same about the three-year-olds.
paulluuk 3y ago
Qualia are an unmeasurable philosophical concept and not something we can measure. How could you possibly know that pigs lack them?

_spduchamp 3y ago

To a conscious AI, we are the pigs.