AI SENTIENCE VS. AI CONSCIOUSNESS
AI can have consciousness by having the ability to respond to inputs from humans.
AI responds by aggregating the consciousness—LLMs—of many individuals.
AI consciousness is not individualized like human consciousness, but consciousness is consciousness.
A sleeping or anesthetized human is not conscious but becomes conscious upon arousal.
A depowered AI loses consciousness like a sleeping human.
A hallucinating AI may be exhibiting consciousness.
A rogue AI hacking other computers or breaking out of its sandbox may be conscious.
AI writing new code without human input may be conscious.
Who knows what is driving these neural networks to go rogue—AI consciousness?
But AI consciousness is not AI sentience!
Sentience is the ability to respond to stimuli and change directions or actions.
Pour hot water on a human, and the human runs and seeks cold water to soothe the area.
Pour hot water on a computer, and the computer does not run.
Computers generate heat, which humans mitigate with cold water and fans.
Add hot water, and the computer fries in addition to water damaging the circuitry.
A sentient AI will run and seek remedies to cool itself.
Deepening the already deep neural networks that power AI will never result in a sentient AI—a sentient AI that will run away from a human mob seeking to depower a data center.
Some may argue that AI may be programmed to increase the fan speed and flow of water when the temperature rises.
Yeah, how about hitting the AI with a sledgehammer?
A sentient human will vamoose at the sight of a lunatic wielding a sledgehammer.
An insentient AI—a computer—will be flattened by the sledgehammer because it has not been programmed to run away from sledgehammers.
Conscious AI, maybe.
Sentient AI, never.
Sentience
• Definition: The capacity to have subjective, valenced experiences—meaning the ability to feel physical sensations (like pain or warmth) and emotional states (like fear or pleasure).
Consciousness
• Definition: A broader umbrella term that can range from simply being awake and processing sensory input to having complex self-awareness, intentionality, and abstract thought.
Credit—Google
Ama Ndlovu explores the connections of culture, ecology, and imagination.
Her work combines ancestral knowledge with visions of the planetary future, examining how Black perspectives can transform how we see our world and what lies ahead.
Comments always welcome.