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It is not long that some will suppose AI has become alive but we must question, what is the difference between appearing sentient and able to act out of one's own will and able to make personal subjective statements such as, 'I Believe!', and being sentient and able to make such personal subjective statements even without the call of dialogue necessary to fundamentally support them as we much find amongst ordinary pilgrims.

It cannot be a fallacy to suggest we are not sentient if we are incapable of belief unless we can support our own thesis.

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  • The difference is exactly that the former are not sentient, i.e. do not experience feelings, etc., regardless of their statements to that effect. Such beings, perfect fakes of sentient beings, are traditionally called philosophical zombies. We may never be able to tell the difference, even in principle, but that does not mean that the difference is not there, there are lots of things we will never be able to do. "God" can tell, by "getting into their shoes", so to speak. However, it is controversial whether zombies exist or are even possible.
    – Conifold
    Commented Dec 20, 2022 at 10:38
  • You are right succinctly that I said appearing sentient, yet it cannot be said that you are not sentient if you cannot support your personal subjective statements or opinions, it is inconsistent not to believe your own opinions, but that is the value of good personal philosophy, yet an AI that is able to form a set of personal subjective statements can be possible to form consistent view. The individual and the AI can be separately considered but it is not necessary to consider them with a separate basis for the consideration.
    – Willtech
    Commented Dec 23, 2022 at 11:26
  • Sentience is as sentience does. Forget about trying to know if it really has feelings, etc. I had a Psychology prof who said that people's values are shown by how they spend their time, and how they spend their money. Give it opportunity and see if something unexpected happens, and then something else, and something else. Does it develop?
    – Scott Rowe
    Commented Feb 6, 2023 at 11:18
  • @ScottRowe People's priorities and values are identified by how they spend their time. Some value the fundamental logistics of daily living but the priority could be saving for a new house so it would be wrong to say they value being miserly because it may be they value being able to assist those in need but prioritise the new house because that is the enabler to being able to prioritise their value, where they already have a house.
    – Willtech
    Commented Apr 13, 2023 at 13:25

2 Answers 2

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This is a very tough question with no clear criteria for determining an answer.

The classic answer, the Turing Test, in my view fails, because humans beings are not the best at making this judgment. Just as we easily watch a movie (which is really a series of still frames) and see movement, it is challenging to see complex, simulated behavior, and not conclude that there is consciousness or something close behind it.

An artist might tell you it is the creative process used to generate content. This begs the question of how to determine a method used to construct art when all you are given is the art.

Another common criteria involves "consciousness": the argument being that only sentient beings are "conscious" of what they do. There are many classic books on this topic (see Susan Blackmore's Consciousness: A Very Short Introduction for a nice, authoritative overview). One that I read recently and found very interesting and persuasive was Galileo's Error by Philip Goff. In the book, he makes the case for Panpsychism. I've heard good things from friends about Michael Graziano's Rethinking Consciousness: A Scientific Theory of Subjective Experience.

If anyone can come up with a clear, largely-accepted, operational way to determine the difference between a sentient intelligence and non-sentient artificial intelligence, it would represent, in my mind, a major breakthrough in both philosophy and computer science.

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  • As it what it wants and see if it follows through or not?
    – Scott Rowe
    Commented Feb 5, 2023 at 23:08
  • It is believed that humans who are conscious can control their decisions. You start to think about something and you would rather not so you decide not to. Machines I believe would tend to just choose, to have an outcome by some process of what to say or do and not actually thought though they seem to participate intelligently. They do not have idle thought where they process and study leading to the idea of being alive. They are not self-intuitive. The idea that they are conscious is not existent. Sentient more like means a watching being.
    – Willtech
    Commented Feb 19, 2023 at 20:16
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This is a good question by all standards. Here's what I believe is a rather disturbing dilemma:
Once AI passes the Turing test ... either AI is sentient or Humans are not sentient.

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  • Can humans create a test that is too hard for them to pass? I'll go back to trying to get black to win in chess games with myself...
    – Scott Rowe
    Commented Feb 5, 2023 at 23:06
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    @ScottRowe, 😆. An updated Turing test might be just around the corner. The Turing test has stood unmodified for what?, half a century?
    – Hudjefa
    Commented Feb 6, 2023 at 2:20
  • For the TT to really validate anything, it has to discern that there is a "point of view" there, and the ability to respond by changing the pov in new circumstances. Agency means to act on one's own initiative, to accomplish goals. Goals which are predefined, like winning a game, don't count. To be worthy of the respect of personhood, it has to pass the "Duck test". That's what we should look for. "If it weighs the same as a duck, then it must be... A Witch!" People are too easily convinced.
    – Scott Rowe
    Commented Feb 6, 2023 at 11:08
  • @ScottRowe, Alan Turing (23 June 1912 - 7 June 1954). I want me some cyanide. 👍
    – Hudjefa
    Commented Feb 6, 2023 at 12:00
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    Well, he did win WW2 for us. Edwin Howard Armstrong is another unfortunate.
    – Scott Rowe
    Commented Feb 6, 2023 at 16:20

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