196

also, it is possible that consciousness isnt computational at all; cannot emerge from mere computational processes, but instead comes from wet, noisy quantum effects in micro tubules in our brains…

I keep seeing this idea more now since the Penrose paper came out. Tbh, I think if what you’re saying was testable, then we’d be able prove it with simple organisms like C.elegans or zebrafish. Maybe there are interesting experiments to done, and I hope someone does them, but I think it’s the wrong question because it’s based on incorrect assumptions (ie that consciousness isn’t an emergent property of neurons once they reach some organization). Per my estimation, we haven’t even asked the emergent property question properly yet. To me it seems if you create a self aware non-biological entity then it will exhibit some degree of consciousness, and doubly so if you program it with survival and propagation instincts.

But more importantly, we don’t need a conscious entity for it to be intelligent. We’ve had computers and calculators forever which could do amazing maths, and to me the LLMs are simply a natural language “calculator”. What’s missing from LLMs are self-check constraints, which are hard to impose given the breadth and depth of human knowledge expressed in languages. Still however, a LLM does not need self awareness or any other aspect of consciousness to maintain these self check bounds. I believe the current direction is to impose self checking by introducing strong memory and logic checks, which is still a hard problem.