I asked ChatGPT if it is sentient, and I can't really argue with its pointSubmitted by wtfcommittee t3_1041wol in singularity
turnip_burrito t1_j32ciki wrote
ChatGPT just contradicted itself.
It defined consciousness using subjective experience, and then turned around and said it is not clear if subjective experience is necessary for consciousness.
If you look closely at what it actually says, you will sometimes find absurd contradictions like this.
ProShortKingAction t1_j32rvyt wrote
It's not in a discord debate with philosophy nerds, it was told to represent itself as a high school teacher which is why it makes a lot of sense for it to put forward multiple possible ideas and help the student figure it out for themselves instead of giving one definitive answer on an open ended question
elfballs t1_j35w15z wrote
But it doesn't say "another possibility is...", instead it clearly had an inconsistent position, or rather no position at all. It's just words.
PIPPIPPIPPIPPIP555 t1_j33s94d wrote
But Consciousness IS Subjective Experience and there is no Philosopher that is saying that the conciousness is not subjective Experience because that is litteraly what it is
ajahiljaasillalla t1_j340kpd wrote
Consciousness could be a feature of universe, like some kind of field. So the brain could stand in the same relation to consciousness as radio to radio waves.
Revolutionary_Soft42 t1_j35kyd8 wrote
Yeah the resonance theory of consciousness , our human meat suits are just antennas orchestrating our consciousness
eve_of_distraction t1_j34av6f wrote
Oh yes there are. There are plenty of catastrophically confused philosophers when it comes to this. Have you read any Dan Dennett?
williamfwm t1_j350zmd wrote
That's because Dan Dennett is a p-zombie. He's never experienced consciousness, so he can't fathom what it is. Same goes for a number of other eliminative materialists such as the Churchlands, Graziano, Blackmore, etc
Interestingly, Richard Dawkins the mega-reductionist-Uber-atheist is not one, and neither is Kurzweil, who believes in computationalism (functionalism); you'd be hard pressed to find it in his books, but he slipped and all but admitted that consciousness is something that transcends reductionism in a reply he wrote to Jaron Lanier's One Half A Manifesto in the early 2000s
It would help the discussion if we could steal the terminology back, because it's been zombified by Dennett (continuing what his mentor Ryle started) and his ilk. I think we ought to distinguish "Dennettian Consciousness" (where 'consciousness' is just a convenient, abstract label for the bag of tricks the brain can perform) and "Chalmerian Consciousness" (the real kind of consciousness, the reduction-transcending-ineffable, for people who believe in the Hard Problem)
PIPPIPPIPPIPPIP555 t1_j366ifj wrote
Dan Dennett does not deny Subjective Experience he is saying that Qualia (The subjective Experience) is NOT incorrigible, ineffable, private nor directly accessible and this does not mean that Subjective Experience does not exist it does only imply that the processes that Creates the Experience is Physical processes in the brain
eve_of_distraction t1_j3676h2 wrote
He said consciousness is an illusion though.
FusionRocketsPlease t1_j36ke9e wrote
Yup. Now it remains to know how rays qualitative characteristics arise from quantities without these characteristics. If you talk about emergency, you'll get a block.
FusionRocketsPlease t1_j550mgb wrote
>mega-reductionist-Uber-atheist
šš
Technologenesis t1_j33xi6n wrote
Lots of philosophers have differing definitions of consciousness. I ultimately agree that subjective experience is a necessary component, but there are others who want to construe consciousness in more concrete physical / functional terms.
wtfcommittee OP t1_j32han1 wrote
Thatās not really a contradiction. It provided the dictionary definition of consciousness, and then suggested that this definition can be argued against since a few philosophers mentioned subjective experiences arenāt necessary.
Itās not saying emphatically that subjective experience is unnecessary for consciousness. Just questioning the definition.
bubster15 t1_j33tsg7 wrote
I like this answer personally. How does one even define consciousness? Subjective thought? I personally donāt think so but the who hell knows?
Subjective thought is Darwinism at work. We need to perceive only what helps us survive and pass our genetics, trying to get the full picture of the world is a futile cause. Evolution said screw that, letās just smooth over the real stuff we canāt actively comprehend.
We canāt fully grasp the world around us, not even close, so what makes us more conscious than a dog? We can perceive marginally more but neither species comes even remotely close to full worldly perception.
eve_of_distraction t1_j34bgz0 wrote
> personally donāt think so but the who hell knows?
You don't think consciousness is defined by subjectivity?
>so what makes us more conscious than a dog?
Do you think dogs have subjective experience? It seems absurd to think they don't.
turnip_burrito t1_j32kbzp wrote
Nope. It's a contradiction.
The moment you define a word to mean one thing, you are no longer searching for its meaning. You have found it. You have defined it.
wtfcommittee OP t1_j32l9r1 wrote
But the definition of consciousness itself is subjective. There is no fixed answer.
turnip_burrito t1_j32ob9d wrote
It is simple. What the definition of "consciousness" should be to begin with is subjective. But once you define something, you should not contradict it unless you explicitly change which real world things it is describing.
How silly would it be for me to define dogs as "canines kept as pets" and then later say "well, dogs don't have to be canines"? That's what has happened with ChatGPT.
Feebleminded10 t1_j3346ky wrote
That makes no sense bro how the ai clearly explains its point and logic but you still donāt get it? At the end the person said reply how a teacher would too.
turnip_burrito t1_j3378fq wrote
It clearly explains it in a way that is incorrect.
mulder0990 t1_j33hto1 wrote
Is a square a rectangle?
Things can be defined and have nuanced change based on new knowledge all while keeping its original definition.
turnip_burrito t1_j33mwbc wrote
Not if the definition is "B is A" and the nuanced change is "B is not A". Try making those coexist together. You can't. lol
I can't believe people are defending this. It's a chatbot. And it contradicted itself. It does this often if you play with it.
bubster15 t1_j33qj5q wrote
I donāt see how it contradicted itself at all.
Ultimately it argues consciousness is tricky and not well understood scientifically, thus, it highlights some thought experiments where we guess some of the rules to āconsciousnessā and see if it makes sense to our understanding.
Consciousness is impossible to define even for humans. We have no idea what ultimately makes us conscious but it uses subjective thought as an example of what we generally are looking for in āconsciousnessā
turnip_burrito t1_j33unnx wrote
If consciousness isn't the subjective experience, and it isn't the externally observable physical system, then there is nothing left for it to be, except perhaps a third thing like a "soul". It is logically impossible for a word to sensibly mean anything except one or a subset of those three things. Consciousness, to mean anything, would be one of those or some aspect of those. The cause or process of it is not determinable now, but the thing itself can be put to words easily.
If something is impossible to define, then the word should not be used in a serious discussion.
eve_of_distraction t1_j34apbl wrote
Some people including famous philosophers are deeply confused about this. Look at Dan Dennett for example, claiming consciousness is an illusion. It stems from an alarming lack of introspection.
lucas-lejeune t1_j33a3oc wrote
Yeah well I do contradict myself all the time also
2Punx2Furious t1_j34y066 wrote
> you will sometimes find absurd contradictions like this
Quite often actually. Still, it's impressive that it still manages to sound plausible and eloquent enough.
turnip_burrito t1_j34y3f6 wrote
Yes, I'm very impressed by its language fluency.
visarga t1_j34sywj wrote
How do you define consciousness? I define it as "understanding". Ability to reason in new situations. The witness, or the judge that decides the actions we are going to take.
turnip_burrito t1_j34xhjf wrote
If I have to use the word, I use it to mean just "qualia", but I usually don't use the word "consciousness" because other words are more productive imo.
I usually don't care what it means in a conversation, as long as it is clearly defined. The biggest problem with the word, imo, is different people have different definitions for it (ok as long as clarified), which causes long drawn out pseudo-deep conversations where two people are using the same word differently.
So your definition is fine (and interesting), thanks for sharing!
FederalScientist6876 t1_j3kae4p wrote
No it didnāt. The terms like consciousness are not well defined as of today. It is giving multiple perspectives ways to define and understand what consciousness is and isnāt
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