It's not hype. It's a language problem that makes people like you think this way.
The problem is consciousness is a vocabulary word that establishes a hard boundary where such a boundary doesn't exit. The language makes you think either something is conscious or it is not when the reality is that these two concepts are actually extreme endpoints on a gradient.
The vocabulary makes the concept seem binary and makes it seem more profound then it actually is.
Thus we have no problem identifying things at the extreme. A rock is not conscious. That's obvious. A human IS conscious, that's also obvious. But only because these two objects are defined at the extremes of this gradient.
For something fuzzy like chatGPT, we get confused. We think the problem is profound, but in actuality it's just poorly defined vocabulary. The word consciousness, again, assumes the world is binary that something is either/or, but, again, the reality is a gradient.
When we have debates about whether something is "conscious" or not we are just arguing about where the line of demarcation is drawn along the gradient. Does it need a body to be conscious? Does it need to be able to do math? Where you draw this line is just a definition of vocabulary. So arguments about whether LLMs are conscious are arguments about vocabulary.
We as humans are biased and we blindly allow the vocabulary to mold our thinking. Is chatGPT conscious? It's a loaded question based on a world view manipulated by the vocabulary. It doesn't even matter. That boundary is fuzzy, and any vocab attempting to describe this gradient is just arbitrary.
But hear me out. chatGPT and DALL-E is NOT hype. Why? Because along that gradient it's leaps and bounds further than anything we had just even a decade ago. It's the closest we ever been to the extreme endpoint. Whichever side you are on in the great debate both sides can very much agree with this logic.
But it's not obvious at all. It may possess consciousness in a way we can't relate to or communicate with.
This is the whole problem with consciousness and has been discussed by philosophers for centuries. We each appear to be conscious but can't be certain anything else is or isn't.
Yeah I stopped reading since it's based on a false predicate. I've read the rest and it's still undermined by the same unprovable assumption.
Perhaps consciousness is binary and the rock is just as conscious as a human. We don't know. But consciousness != intelligence, and it's reasonable to assume humans are more intelligent than rocks of course, but we can't say anything about each one's level of consciousness.
"consciousness" is a word made up by humans. There's no way someone can make up a word without "knowing" what it means.
If we made up a word and we don't know what it means that means we "chose" not to know what it means. We made up the fact that we don't know. Ultimately all words in the english language are made up by humans.
The concept of consciousness itself doesn't exist. It exists because we made up a word for it. And the concept seems fuzzy because the word was made up and a fuzzy definition for it was chosen.
When you debate what "consciousness" is you are debating the definition of the word. This is not profound. The word is made up, the definition is arbitrarily chosen. You are debating a vocabulary problem what arbitrary definition should be attached to what arbitrary word. You are attempting to refine the fuzzy boundaries of a definition that we as humans already made fuzzy by our own choice.
Take a car and a boat. If I made some vehicle that can both drive on the road and sail on the water, is it a car or a boat? What you're not seeing is that it doesn't matter. It's just a vehicle, but the words "car" and "boat" lock you into this delusional debate that's attempting to classify the car-boat as one or the other. Do you understand? The concept of a car and a boat is poorly defined language influencing the way you think. Whether the vehicle is a car or a boat is meaningless. Same with consciousness.
If you still don't get it. How about this. I'll make up a new concept called Flurmo. Flurmo is something that is 30-40% a car and 60-70% a boat. Now when you debate whether the vehicle is a car or a boat you have to consider whether it's a flurmo as well. Car, boat or flurmo? It's easy to see how flurmo is made up, it's harder to see why car and boat are the SAME thing, they are also words that are made up. And so is consciousness. Consciousness is flurmo.
You stopped reading, because you made a false assumption. You then continued reading on my prompt and you came out with a conclusion based off of you misunderstanding the point. Hopefully you get what I'm saying now.
Sorry, just wrong on so many levels. Consciousness is not a concept, it's a self-evident experience. A rose by any other name would be just as beautiful, etc.
Also, you're not being rational and consistent. First you say no body truly knows what consciousness is, that philosophers debate about it... then you define it as an "experience." Two inconsistent statements. For your second statement? Isn't that just a definition you chose that many "philosophers" disagree/agree with?
Don't answer that question. It's rhetorical. A rational discussion. can't be had with someone who is inconsistent with the statements he makes or someone who is deliberately trolling. I suspect you are the later.
The problem is consciousness is a vocabulary word that establishes a hard boundary where such a boundary doesn't exit. The language makes you think either something is conscious or it is not when the reality is that these two concepts are actually extreme endpoints on a gradient.
The vocabulary makes the concept seem binary and makes it seem more profound then it actually is.
Thus we have no problem identifying things at the extreme. A rock is not conscious. That's obvious. A human IS conscious, that's also obvious. But only because these two objects are defined at the extremes of this gradient.
For something fuzzy like chatGPT, we get confused. We think the problem is profound, but in actuality it's just poorly defined vocabulary. The word consciousness, again, assumes the world is binary that something is either/or, but, again, the reality is a gradient.
When we have debates about whether something is "conscious" or not we are just arguing about where the line of demarcation is drawn along the gradient. Does it need a body to be conscious? Does it need to be able to do math? Where you draw this line is just a definition of vocabulary. So arguments about whether LLMs are conscious are arguments about vocabulary.
We as humans are biased and we blindly allow the vocabulary to mold our thinking. Is chatGPT conscious? It's a loaded question based on a world view manipulated by the vocabulary. It doesn't even matter. That boundary is fuzzy, and any vocab attempting to describe this gradient is just arbitrary.
But hear me out. chatGPT and DALL-E is NOT hype. Why? Because along that gradient it's leaps and bounds further than anything we had just even a decade ago. It's the closest we ever been to the extreme endpoint. Whichever side you are on in the great debate both sides can very much agree with this logic.