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j-pbtoday at 8:18 PM1 replyview on HN

There is no hidden inner monologue. Human inner monologues produce measurable micoactivations that are the same as the ones produced in speech.

If it's not in the inner COT it isn't there.


Replies

ben_wtoday at 8:36 PM

I don't see how this adds much to either a pro or con argument.

An inner monologue isn't something all humans have[0]. It is unclear to me how well (or poorly) Chain of Thought mimics intrapersonal communication. J-space probes (and other things) suggest there are, in fact, other aspects to LLM "thought" besides a CoT scratchpad[1].

However, regardless of how those questions pan out, qualia (of emotions in this case, but the problem is in general) is its own mystery, one for which we are still, so far as I can tell, unable to make progress with.

We kinda know what emotions are for, what function they serve in our genetic fitness, but why do they feel like anything? We do not know, they just do.

[0] https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/inside-the-mind/human... and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intrapersonal_communication

[1] https://www.anthropic.com/research/global-workspace