Birch, The Edge of Sentience (2024), ch. 16 - "simply no way to assess sentience in an LLM"
Schwitzgebel, AI and Consciousness (2025) - "we won't know before we've already manufactured thousands or millions of disputably conscious AI".
Butlin, Long et al., Consciousness in Artificial Intelligence: Insights from the Science of Consciousness (2023) - "no obvious technical barriers to building AI systems which satisfy these indicators".
Chalmers, Could a Large Language Model Be Conscious? (2023) - "within the next decade, we may well have systems that are serious candidates for consciousness".
Long, Sebo, Butlin, Birch et al., Taking AI Welfare Seriously (2024) - "there is a realistic possibility that some AI systems will be conscious and/or robustly agentic in the near future".
Dreksler, Caviola, Chalmers, Sebo et al., Subjective Experience in AI Systems: What Do AI Researchers and the Public Believe? (2025) - survey of 582 AI researchers; median estimate of 25% by 2034, and only 10% that such systems will never exist.
We cannot test for that which we cannot define. Given that we cannot rigorously define sentience, we cannot test for it. Doesn't really matter whether we're talking about people who are locked in comas, "brain-dead" individuals, dolphins, primates, dogs, or the carefully polished and arranged minerals that we call processors.
There are those who believe that were they reduced to life support, they would no longer be alive and should therefore not be supported by said machines.
There are those who believe that penguins, dolphins, eagles, and more are sentient beings that make choices understanding the consequences, develop love of their partners and mourn their losses, and feel, display, and act upon their emotions.
There are those who believe that fungi/trees/plants are either individually sentient or sentient as a part of a network. Choosing to sacrifice their own nutrients to answer the call of a wounded neighbor, for instance.
Although, there are also those who believe that human's don't have any special unique quality that isn't shared by either all living things or all things in general. These individuals already believe that the machines have the same kinds of qualities as we do. They are slow when they are unhealthy (needing a dusting or coolant loop bleeding being equivalent to us needing some fresh air for instance) and uncooperative when upset (by a virus, full hard drive, or oom).
I'd strongly agree there are no non-contradictory definitions of consciousness among those that commonly appear. But it's a category that, despite these contradiction, hasn't become marginal in the fashion of the aether or the theory of the flat earth. I think this because people indeed need it to bridge the biological world and the world of ethics and legality. I think that if we have a system of legality and systems of opportunity humans should be legally equal persons and have equal opportunity. But humans are manifestly unequal (though overall more incomparable than orderable in a system of ranks). Most people need some concept of essence to justify ethical equality among people. And so consciousness stays in people's minds however contradictory.
Which I think gives the article's point validity. Confused definitions of consciousness can give really confused ideas about ethical behavior regards "intelligent" computer programs. And things are confusing enough otherwise.
> despite these contradiction, hasn't become marginal in the fashion of the aether or the theory of the flat earth. I think this because people indeed need it to bridge the biological world and the world of ethics and legality.
Sometimes the replies in these threads leave me wondering if p-zombies are real. It isn't that there are contradictions, it's that we literally do not know how to define the thing. And it has not fallen out of fashion because it is self evidently real - we all experience it.
We don't need it in order to bridge anything. Legality and ethics are largely game theory, however there are some aspects of both that only exist due to it. So it isn't some abstract concept used to bridge other concepts but rather a concrete thing that influences our way of doing things.
Consciousness is to our universe as a video game player is to the in-game universe. Some games even call player connections "souls" or "minds" - a character belonging to a player who's lost connection may be "unconscious" or a "zombie".
Game characters, unless they've been made to break the fourth wall, have no idea what this means or why this happens.
I don't mean to imply our universe is a video game, since it would be games all the way up.
qarl · · focus · HN ↗
Schwitzgebel, AI and Consciousness (2025) - "we won't know before we've already manufactured thousands or millions of disputably conscious AI".
Butlin, Long et al., Consciousness in Artificial Intelligence: Insights from the Science of Consciousness (2023) - "no obvious technical barriers to building AI systems which satisfy these indicators".
Chalmers, Could a Large Language Model Be Conscious? (2023) - "within the next decade, we may well have systems that are serious candidates for consciousness".
Long, Sebo, Butlin, Birch et al., Taking AI Welfare Seriously (2024) - "there is a realistic possibility that some AI systems will be conscious and/or robustly agentic in the near future".
Dreksler, Caviola, Chalmers, Sebo et al., Subjective Experience in AI Systems: What Do AI Researchers and the Public Believe? (2025) - survey of 582 AI researchers; median estimate of 25% by 2034, and only 10% that such systems will never exist.
goodmythical · · focus · HN ↗
There are those who believe that were they reduced to life support, they would no longer be alive and should therefore not be supported by said machines.
There are those who believe that penguins, dolphins, eagles, and more are sentient beings that make choices understanding the consequences, develop love of their partners and mourn their losses, and feel, display, and act upon their emotions.
There are those who believe that fungi/trees/plants are either individually sentient or sentient as a part of a network. Choosing to sacrifice their own nutrients to answer the call of a wounded neighbor, for instance.
Although, there are also those who believe that human's don't have any special unique quality that isn't shared by either all living things or all things in general. These individuals already believe that the machines have the same kinds of qualities as we do. They are slow when they are unhealthy (needing a dusting or coolant loop bleeding being equivalent to us needing some fresh air for instance) and uncooperative when upset (by a virus, full hard drive, or oom).
joe_the_user · · focus · HN ↗
Which I think gives the article's point validity. Confused definitions of consciousness can give really confused ideas about ethical behavior regards "intelligent" computer programs. And things are confusing enough otherwise.
fc417fc802 · · focus · HN ↗
Sometimes the replies in these threads leave me wondering if p-zombies are real. It isn't that there are contradictions, it's that we literally do not know how to define the thing. And it has not fallen out of fashion because it is self evidently real - we all experience it.
We don't need it in order to bridge anything. Legality and ethics are largely game theory, however there are some aspects of both that only exist due to it. So it isn't some abstract concept used to bridge other concepts but rather a concrete thing that influences our way of doing things.
mitxela · · focus · HN ↗
Game characters, unless they've been made to break the fourth wall, have no idea what this means or why this happens.
I don't mean to imply our universe is a video game, since it would be games all the way up.