The question of whether chatbots are “truly intelligent” is the dumbest question people regularly debate about AI. First of all, we do not and have never had a

The question of whether chatbots are “truly intelligent” is the dumbest question people regularly debate about AI. First of all, we do not and have never had a rigorous and falsifiable definition of “intelligence”, so this question can’t actually be answered. I’ve watched people tie themselves in knots over why “AI doesn’t think like humans” only to find themselves reinventing the Chinese Room Paradox. I’ve watched people on this site get blue in the face that “it should be called Machine Learning and not Artificial Intelligence”… because machines can’t be intelligent but they can learn? Second, it’s inconsequential. If a chatbot can deliver passable performance at a job at 1% of the cost of a human, it’s going to cause a massive problem for human workers whether it has a mortal soul or not. If generative AI is pumping the internet with slop, that sucks whether the AI is doing it out of malevolent intent or a million dot products.