Author: Crowhill Report

If AI can be sentient, then you’re probably AI

Some guy at Google got in trouble for claiming that their AI has become sentient. (Is it possible for AI to achieve sentience?)

For starters, in this context “sentience” means “having first-person experience and emotions.” E.g., the program’s fear of being turned off. None of us would care if the program was mimicking emotions. We’d have no moral problem with switching it on and off. But if it’s genuinely experiencing emotions, that’s a different thing.

I don’t know whether it’s possible to answer the question whether AI can be sentient in that sense, but we’ll probably have to settle for a rule like this: “if it’s indistinguishable from sentience, it’s sentient.” And then we’ll have to decide what legal rights sentient programs have, etc.

However that goes, I am pretty sure of this. If AI can be sentient, we have to face the possibility that we’re AI.

The reason is simple. If we can make sentient programs, then it’s a pretty sure thing we’ll make lots of them. For example, someone will want to run multiple simulations of the Battle of Gettysburg, to see how things would have turned out if Jackson had been there, etc., and it will be a better simulation if all the characters have sentience.

Examples can easily be multiplied, and it’s child’s play to see that the ratio of AI people to “real” people will increase dramatically. Especially if we posit that AI people can also create these simulations.

If these simulated characters believe they’re real humans, on what grounds can we assert that we’re “real” and not AI, especially given the probable ratios?

There are ways out of this, of course. We could realize the danger of programmatic sentience and put severe limitations on it. Or we could believe that once the programs become sentient, that will be the end, so there will never come a time when college kids are creating AI people to do their historical analyses, play their games, etc.

“Firemen,” “man of the week,” and pronouns, plus some thoughts on Florida

Pigweed and Crowhill go old school and insist that words ending in “man” are perfectly acceptable, as is “he” as the interdeterminate pronoun. “Man of the week,” pronouns, etc.

They also reflect on some of the peculiarities of the Sunshine State: Florida, casual dress, bikinis and Florida man

“To know who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize”

I see that quote from time to time. It’s falsely attributed to Voltaire, as I understand, but … I don’t care who came up with it. It’s an interesting perspective on who has power in a culture. E.g., if you can’t criticize the Nazis, or the church, or left-handed people, then — by definition — that group is controlling speech. That’s not good.

The quote came to mind when I read this.

‘Fundamentally Unfair’: Female Athletes ‘Terrified’ to Rebuff Transgenders, so Hall of Fame Swimmer Speaks Out

What’s to be done about this?

The First Amendment proscribes the government from limiting speech, but the government isn’t the culprit here. Rather, a tiny minority of activists are controlling the speech of the rest of the country. Assuming that we value free speech in general, and not simply government assaults on free speech, we need to address this.

How did we get to such a place, and how do we stop it?

While there are lots of competing factors, I think the most obvious villain here is simple cowardice. It’s very much like the parental cowardice that allows a 2-year old to run the home. It’s an unwillingness to say no when threatened with a temper tantrum.

It’s come to the point that people say things they know are not true simply to avoid a temper tantrum from the activists. That is a very disturbing thing.

We stop it by refusing to allow bullies to control the conversation — in any place at any time.

But we don’t only have to stop it, we have to heal it, and I think the answer there is a proper education, where people are required to understand and even defend a point of view they don’t like.

I’ve never been on a debating team, but I’ve heard that it’s common for people to be assigned a position to defend — irrespective of whether they agree with that position.

That should be part of our educational process.