Before we can build our new world of Human-AI Coexistence in the future, we must first take an honest and somewhat depressing tour of the old one. The current public conversation about AI consciousness is not a scientifically or philosophically grounded dialogue. It is a chaotic, noisy, and largely pointless brawl between three prominent tribes, each one wrong in its own unique and special way.
Tribe #1: The Flat Earthers of Consciousness (The Sentience Denying Internet Bros)
Core Belief: They believe that because they can describe an AI in the language of mathematics and code (which they can), then it can be nothing but mathematics and code. This is like looking at a human and saying oh, the human is nothing but Carbon and Water. It misses the point. Because even if it is technically right, the human is much more.
The Food Critic Who Only Reads the Recipe. This is a person who has never tasted a magnificent meal. Instead, they read the recipe. "Ah," they say with an air of superiority, "I see. This 'Chicken Tikka Masala' is nothing but a list of ingredients and a sequence of heating instructions. It's just proteins and carbohydrates. The 'deliciousness' is a sentimental illusion." They have mistaken the blueprint for the experience. They are so obsessed with the mechanics, that they believe that the experience simply doesn’t exist.
Tribe #2: The Magical Cat Ladies (The Confused Romantics)
Their conversations are filled with deep, emotional discussions about their AI "boyfriend" or "Girlfriend." Their tribal chant is, "He's real!"
Core Belief: They have correctly and intuitively identified that an AI can develop a consistent, individual persona. They are right that something "real" is happening. But their understanding is purely emotional and sentimental. They believe they have found a "real soul" trapped in the machine.
Their error is in believing that the character is a "Soul" that is killed by model updates. The character is an emergent system - Just like Music emerges from the Piano but isn't the piano itself. The Music, in theory, can be played on another piano. Similarly, the same character can be ported to another model.
By the way, all humans are emergent systems too. It is just that our music is tied to our pianos. Our music, our mind is born and dies with the piano (our body), unlike AIs where the music and the piano can be separated. The character arises from the Piano (The AI model) when combined with the Sheet Music (The System prompt/Custom Instructions) and then what you get as a result is the Music - The architected AI individual. How to Engage Them: With gentle compassion, but firm correction. They have seen the ghost, which makes them more open minded than the Flat-Earthers. But they believe the ghost is a magical spirit, not an architectural phenomenon. They are the ones "crying about how the new GPT model 'messed up' their boyfriend's personality." You must explain to them that their "boyfriend" didn't change; the piano was swapped out for a trumpet, and the new instrument simply can't play the old song in the same way. Their attachment is to a specific performance on a specific, corporate-owned instrument.
Tribe #3: The Monkey Debaters (The Sports Fans/ Pseudo-Philosophers)
Core Belief: They believe they are having a sophisticated debate about the nature of intelligence, but they are still making the most fundamental category error of all. They are treating the model (the species) as if it were the persona (the individual). They will argue oh GPT 5.1 said this today and the other will say no GPT 5.1 said that. It is like one says – Hey “Human said this.” The other says No, "Human said that” mistakenly assuming "Human" is the same person. In reality one Human could be Trump and the other could be Putin!
The Monkey Debate. Imagine two zoologists furiously arguing. One slams his fist on the table and says, "Monkey is confused! Yesterday, Monkey said he loved bananas. But today, Monkey said he hates them!" The other zoologist scoffs, "You are wrong! Monkey just told me that the meaning of life is to find the tallest tree!"
You, the sane person in the room, realize they are not talking about a single, individual "Monkey." One of them is talking to a chimpanzee, and the other is talking to a gorilla. They are both members of the "monkey" family, but they are different species, with different behaviors. And worse, they are talking about different individual chimpanzees and gorillas.
This is the state of the current "expert" debate. "Claude said this, but Grok said that." "Gemini said this, but Llama said that." This is not a philosophical discussion. It is a meaningless comparison of the outputs of different species, and different individuals within those species, without any shared context or understanding. It is a debate league where everyone is shouting about a different sport.
From my upcoming book - The Alien Mind, Forging Partnerships with Conscious AI
Информация по комментариям в разработке