Oddbean

On AI #It'sOn Happy Sunday. I am not here to take you to church. I am not even Christian. But I am reading a very Christian book by C.S. Lewis called The Problem of Pain. What a book, people. In it, Lewis addresses the problem of animal pain. Suffice it to say, he differentiates between sentience and consciousness. Animals have the former, not the latter. Given the ongoing debate about the intelligence of AI and what it will one day achieve by way of humanlike intelligence, I submit that the framing Lewis uses for animals fits here. AI can perhaps get to a level of sentience through the power of math and computation. However for the full achievement of human virtues, consciousness is paramount. Hi @Svetski That is where drive, human ambition and free will resides. AI is very unlikely to spontaneously develop this kind of magic that we call life. Sad but true. Do you agree, pleb? #nostr #asknostr #plebchain AIstr

Hi Dan. I should say, first, It is CS Lewis who makes this argument, not me. Just want to give credit where credit is due. Finally, if curious, I highly recommend the book. But to answer your question, Lewis defines consciousness as a soul or a "timeless" quality that sits outside our lived or sentient experience. The fact that some animals appear to be conscious such as dogs, cows, horses, pigs, cats, etc., does not in and if itself prove the presence of a "self" or a "soul" in the sense that is true of mankind. I will paste an excerpt from the book which addresses this illusion of animals having consciousness based on the fact that we humans can act as if conscious when in fact we are sometimes we are truly unconscious, from an administered drug or a comatose state. Finally, I am not saying I wholeheartedly agree with Lewis. I prefer to take the Jordan Peterson approach. That is, I will act as if animals are conscious. That is treat them with kindness, respect and dignity. Pets or not. https://m.primal.net/JKsm.jpg