alt Hacker NewsIt is terribly sad when someone undeniably brilliant in a particular field fails to recognize their own incompetence in other areas - in this case mistaking advanced technology for magic.
Replies
We're going to see increasing numbers of older famous (non computer savvy) figures that we have respected follow his views on this. It's like seeing your favourite celebrity sell out an shill crypto coins, all a bit sad.
Thinking positively, it could just be newsworthy because he is famous and he so misses the mark. Other older famous people might agree with us but that's not news.
Are you implying consciousness is magic? Well, I wouldn't disagree with that really.
I don't think you read carefully what he said. At the end he gave three quite interesting thoughts about what might be true assuming LLMs are less conscious than we are (i.e. assuming our consciousness is not a purely algorithmic phenomenon as we obviously know LLMs are).
the problem is asking if ai is conscious is like asking does ai have a soul. it is not a scientific question and presupposes humans are 'conscious' without even defining the term. to me it is 100% irrelevant if ai is conscious and all discussions about it are based on fallacies and assumptions. what matters to me about ai and matters to other people as well in terms of theory of mind about others is: can i predict how it will work. is it useful. thats it. consciouness is a sophist question with no scientific resolution available and no moral weight until it has consequences.
That's always been Dawkins's shtick though. As an atheist I've generally found him a bit embarrassing
Given that Dawkins is a biologist in his 80s, I'm more disposed towards being charitable than I am when people actively involved in developing LLMs let themselves get bamboozled.