3 ms·

> On what basis could you possibly make this claim? People with absent qualia have been asked, e.g. Knut Nordby: https://www.consc.net/misc/achromat.html https

> On what basis could you possibly make this claim? People with absent qualia have been asked, e.g. Knut Nordby: https://www.consc.net/misc/achromat.html https://www.consc.net/misc/achromat.html "Although I have acquired a thorough theoretical knowledge of the physics of colours and the physiology of the colour receptor mechanisms, nothing of this can help me to understand the true nature of colours. From the history of art I have also learned about the meanings often attributed to colours and how colours have been used at different times, but this too does not give me an understanding of the essential character or quality of colours." Knut Nordby was in the same position as an LLM as far as colours are concerned. He learned all he could but words didn't give him any idea of *what it's like to see them". LLMs have access to everything that's written about colours, but that didn't help Nordby. Nordby's no longer around to ask about image files, but how do you think reading thems would help? He might then have been able to say, e.g. "This pixel is orange," but he still wouldn't have known what it's like to see orange. The same applies to a multimodal LLM.

fc417fc802 1mo ago
I'm not claiming that any particular disabled person has managed to achieve it. I'm asking on what basis you claim it to be categorically impossible. You've claimed that black swans are impossible, I've asked how you arrived at that conclusion, and your answer is that you looked and don't see any. You're here claiming that what submarines do is somehow fundamentally different than swimming and that we know this because they don't have legs. You need legs to swim. And I'm questioning the soundness of your reasoning and you're pointing to cripples without legs who can't swim as evidence. It doesn't make any sense. > He might then have been able to say, e.g. "This pixel is orange," but he still wouldn't have known what it's like to see orange. The same applies to a multimodal LLM. How is a multimodal LLM taking in RGB data fundamentally different than what your eyes are doing? That is the core question that you keep dodging.
- DonaldFisk 29d ago
  > I'm asking on what basis you claim it to be categorically impossible. Because the neural correlates of consciousness wouldn't exist in their brain. I've even looked into what happens if someone, blind from birth, takes LSD. There aren't any large scale studies as it's very difficult to get approval for them, but the short answer appears to be that they don't see things: https://www.livescience.com/62343-psychedelics-lsd-effects-blind-people.html https://www.livescience.com/62343-psychedelics-lsd-effects-b... > How is a multimodal LLM taking in RGB data fundamentally different than what your eyes are doing? The multimodal LLM is a program run as a process on a computer, which isn't aware of what it's running: it's just blindly, repeatedly, executing whatever instruction is at its program counter. The LLM itself isn't doing anything. It's just sitting somewhere in memory being executed by the computer. Brains, on the other hand, don't run programs. Each part of the brain has a special purpose, and somewhere in it there are neurons which correlate with what is being experienced whenever something is looked at.
  - fc417fc802 29d ago
    > Because the neural correlates of consciousness wouldn't exist in their brain. And what are those in concrete terms? Why can't a computer program have those? You have yet to articulate what special property is giving rise to this. > somewhere in it there are neurons which correlate with what is being experienced whenever something is looked at. And what exactly is special about the neuron that the biological hardware can do this but the inorganic can't? Is your claim that current silicon doesn't do this (but future might be able to) or that no silicon construction could _ever_ do this? You have yet to clearly articulate what this magical pixie dust of consciousness is supposed to be.
    - DonaldFisk 23d ago
      > Why can't a computer program have those? Because it isn't a physical object capable of sensing the physical environment, the way the brain is via the sense organs. I don't rule out the possibility that a robot, equipped with with a camera and microphone and processing the information it receives from them might be conscious of sight and sound, but not a program. If I read and execute a computer program in my head, I'm conscious of my thoughts while doing that, but are those thoughts themselves conscious?? I don't think so. What would they be conscious of, anyway? > You have yet to clearly articulate what this magical pixie dust of consciousness is supposed to be. Nobody has an explanation of consciousness, so the magical pixie dust remains a mystery. I think it's fundamental. Nobody has proven the opposite: that it arises from things (e.g. information processing) happening in matter.
  - hippietrail 16d ago
    An LLM is not a program, it's a static data structure consisting of a big bunch of numbers, and as such it cannot be run as it doesn't execute instructions or have a program counter. It is correct that the LLM itself isn't doing anything for this reason. LLMs are more like the neurons. The rest of what you're describing is not the LLM but the inference engine that does many lookups into the model and performs calculations outside the model. Brains do actually do the inference part as well as containing the data structure.

fc417fc802 1mo ago

I'm not claiming that any particular disabled person has managed to achieve it. I'm asking on what basis you claim it to be categorically impossible. You've claimed that black swans are impossible, I've asked how you arrived at that conclusion, and your answer is that you looked and don't see any. You're here claiming that what submarines do is somehow fundamentally different than swimming and that we know this because they don't have legs. You need legs to swim. And I'm questioning the soundness of your reasoning and you're pointing to cripples without legs who can't swim as evidence. It doesn't make any sense. > He might then have been able to say, e.g. "This pixel is orange," but he still wouldn't have known what it's like to see orange. The same applies to a multimodal LLM. How is a multimodal LLM taking in RGB data fundamentally different than what your eyes are doing? That is the core question that you keep dodging.

DonaldFisk 29d ago
> I'm asking on what basis you claim it to be categorically impossible. Because the neural correlates of consciousness wouldn't exist in their brain. I've even looked into what happens if someone, blind from birth, takes LSD. There aren't any large scale studies as it's very difficult to get approval for them, but the short answer appears to be that they don't see things: https://www.livescience.com/62343-psychedelics-lsd-effects-blind-people.html https://www.livescience.com/62343-psychedelics-lsd-effects-b... > How is a multimodal LLM taking in RGB data fundamentally different than what your eyes are doing? The multimodal LLM is a program run as a process on a computer, which isn't aware of what it's running: it's just blindly, repeatedly, executing whatever instruction is at its program counter. The LLM itself isn't doing anything. It's just sitting somewhere in memory being executed by the computer. Brains, on the other hand, don't run programs. Each part of the brain has a special purpose, and somewhere in it there are neurons which correlate with what is being experienced whenever something is looked at.
- fc417fc802 29d ago
  > Because the neural correlates of consciousness wouldn't exist in their brain. And what are those in concrete terms? Why can't a computer program have those? You have yet to articulate what special property is giving rise to this. > somewhere in it there are neurons which correlate with what is being experienced whenever something is looked at. And what exactly is special about the neuron that the biological hardware can do this but the inorganic can't? Is your claim that current silicon doesn't do this (but future might be able to) or that no silicon construction could _ever_ do this? You have yet to clearly articulate what this magical pixie dust of consciousness is supposed to be.
  - DonaldFisk 23d ago
    > Why can't a computer program have those? Because it isn't a physical object capable of sensing the physical environment, the way the brain is via the sense organs. I don't rule out the possibility that a robot, equipped with with a camera and microphone and processing the information it receives from them might be conscious of sight and sound, but not a program. If I read and execute a computer program in my head, I'm conscious of my thoughts while doing that, but are those thoughts themselves conscious?? I don't think so. What would they be conscious of, anyway? > You have yet to clearly articulate what this magical pixie dust of consciousness is supposed to be. Nobody has an explanation of consciousness, so the magical pixie dust remains a mystery. I think it's fundamental. Nobody has proven the opposite: that it arises from things (e.g. information processing) happening in matter.
- hippietrail 16d ago
  An LLM is not a program, it's a static data structure consisting of a big bunch of numbers, and as such it cannot be run as it doesn't execute instructions or have a program counter. It is correct that the LLM itself isn't doing anything for this reason. LLMs are more like the neurons. The rest of what you're describing is not the LLM but the inference engine that does many lookups into the model and performs calculations outside the model. Brains do actually do the inference part as well as containing the data structure.