In search of a biological crux for AI consciousness
Bradford Saad (Global Priorities Institute, University of Oxford)
GPI Working Paper No. 18-2024
Whether AI systems could be conscious is often thought to turn on whether consciousness is closely linked to biology. The rough thought is that if consciousness is closely linked to biology, then AI consciousness is impossible, and if consciousness is not closely linked to biology, then AI consciousness is possible—or, at any rate, it’s more likely to be possible. A clearer specification of the kind of link between consciousness and biology that is crucial for the possibility of AI consciousness would help organize inquiry into the topic. However, I argue, proposed views about the relationship between consciousness and biology tend not to capture a link that is crucial for the possibility of AI consciousness. In addition, I offer a crucial thesis, namely the biological requirement according to which being consciousness at least nomically requires having biological states.
Other working papers
In defence of fanaticism – Hayden Wilkinson (Australian National University)
Consider a decision between: 1) a certainty of a moderately good outcome, such as one additional life saved; 2) a lottery which probably gives a worse outcome, but has a tiny probability of a far better outcome (perhaps trillions of blissful lives created). Which is morally better? Expected value theory (with a plausible axiology) judges (2) as better, no matter how tiny its probability of success. But this seems fanatical. So we may be tempted to abandon expected value theory…
The freedom of future people – Andreas T Schmidt (University of Groningen)
What happens to liberal political philosophy, if we consider not only the freedom of present but also future people? In this article, I explore the case for long-term liberalism: freedom should be a central goal, and we should often be particularly concerned with effects on long-term future distributions of freedom. I provide three arguments. First, liberals should be long-term liberals: liberal arguments to value freedom give us reason to be (particularly) concerned with future freedom…
Can an evidentialist be risk-averse? – Hayden Wilkinson (Global Priorities Institute, University of Oxford)
Two key questions of normative decision theory are: 1) whether the probabilities relevant to decision theory are evidential or causal; and 2) whether agents should be risk-neutral, and so maximise the expected value of the outcome, or instead risk-averse (or otherwise sensitive to risk). These questions are typically thought to be independent – that our answer to one bears little on our answer to the other. …