I agree all these reasons are weak. What I’ve seen a lot less of are good reasons in favor of potential AI consciousness. Maybe that would just be a recap of functionalist arguments, idk.
Incidentally, I have particular disdain for the ‘simulation is not instantiation’ argument. My favorite counterexample is: sure, a simulation of a hurricane does not get you wet, but does a simulation of a calculator add and multiply numbers? Or does a simulation/emulation of an Atari game system let you play Adventure? In other words, simulations of computation are instantiations of computation.
Agreed. I feel like there’s an argument to be made about how consciousness is similar in nature to thinking, and thinking seems computational, so… but I haven’t seen a really compelling version of that anywhere.
I agree all these reasons are weak. What I’ve seen a lot less of are good reasons in favor of potential AI consciousness. Maybe that would just be a recap of functionalist arguments, idk.
Incidentally, I have particular disdain for the ‘simulation is not instantiation’ argument. My favorite counterexample is: sure, a simulation of a hurricane does not get you wet, but does a simulation of a calculator add and multiply numbers? Or does a simulation/emulation of an Atari game system let you play Adventure? In other words, simulations of computation are instantiations of computation.
Agreed. I feel like there’s an argument to be made about how consciousness is similar in nature to thinking, and thinking seems computational, so… but I haven’t seen a really compelling version of that anywhere.