I think LLMs typically use pseudo-random numbers for these calculations, and so are still ultimately deterministic given the seed of the pseudo-random number generator, such that if you re-ran the AI on the same inputs, with the same weights and PRNG seed it would give the same output, with no room for a metaphysical agent to be exerting free will.
We might be talking past each other, possibly my fault if I’m using a non-standard definition of “free will.” But what I’m trying to get at isn’t about decision theory and the way individuals choose between different options to maximize a utility function, it’s instead about the relationship between physical matter and consciousness, and the strong intuitive feeling that my subjective consciousness is an agent that is causing physical events in a way that is not reducible to deterministic physical causation or randomness. And wondering if this is real or an illusion, and noting that AIs certainly do not have some unexplained metaphysical property like this, because their processing of inputs into outputs can be fully traced from end to end. Possible also that your point was about this and I just didn’t correctly understand it. Anyway thanks for the comment!
I think LLMs typically use pseudo-random numbers for these calculations, and so are still ultimately deterministic given the seed of the pseudo-random number generator, such that if you re-ran the AI on the same inputs, with the same weights and PRNG seed it would give the same output, with no room for a metaphysical agent to be exerting free will.
We might be talking past each other, possibly my fault if I’m using a non-standard definition of “free will.” But what I’m trying to get at isn’t about decision theory and the way individuals choose between different options to maximize a utility function, it’s instead about the relationship between physical matter and consciousness, and the strong intuitive feeling that my subjective consciousness is an agent that is causing physical events in a way that is not reducible to deterministic physical causation or randomness. And wondering if this is real or an illusion, and noting that AIs certainly do not have some unexplained metaphysical property like this, because their processing of inputs into outputs can be fully traced from end to end. Possible also that your point was about this and I just didn’t correctly understand it. Anyway thanks for the comment!