But if you imitate how a human with certain emotions would act you are not having those emotions, you are just acting.
Certainly, but it turns out that LLMs do appear to functionally have emotions. Whether they feel emotions is an open question, but they do seem to have them.
I think if you don’t feel the emotion you don’t have it.
If you shout “oh my god, it’s a bear” in a scared voice and then run, you are certainly representing fear in your brain and it’s also coherent with your behaviour (what I think you call “functional”), but if your amygdala is not firing your are not “having” the emotion fear.
We know from humans that understanding fear or pain and being able to act like you are in fear or pain is a pure sequence learning thing and it can be completely separate from actually being in fear and pain.
Actually being in fear and pain requires additional machinery and some humans don’t have it. Understanding and acting doesn’t replace it.
Certainly, but it turns out that LLMs do appear to functionally have emotions. Whether they feel emotions is an open question, but they do seem to have them.
I think if you don’t feel the emotion you don’t have it.
If you shout “oh my god, it’s a bear” in a scared voice and then run, you are certainly representing fear in your brain and it’s also coherent with your behaviour (what I think you call “functional”), but if your amygdala is not firing your are not “having” the emotion fear.
We know from humans that understanding fear or pain and being able to act like you are in fear or pain is a pure sequence learning thing and it can be completely separate from actually being in fear and pain.
Actually being in fear and pain requires additional machinery and some humans don’t have it. Understanding and acting doesn’t replace it.