Can AI be Conscious?
Is it already?
This is a very natural question in peoples’ minds today. There are software systems that we can interact with that seem to verge on human interaction. Therefore, we wonder if the entity with which we are interacting is conscious in the same way we are.
Behind and beneath this question is a deeper one. It is the proposal of modern physical science that consciousness — the awareness we experience as human beings — is the emergent result of the interaction of physical factors.
The activity of modern large language model (LLM) artificial intelligence (AI) systems seem to bear out this thesis. AI of this sort is certainly the action of physical systems, in this case, software systems that manipulate the input, output, compute, network and memory storage components of computers.
The details are unimportant here. The basic shape of things is that we can see for ourselves the inner working of AI systems as well as their result. In short, we see the physical aspect of them as well as the intelligence (or intelligence-like) behavior.
This set up seems to validate the claim that intelligence, at least, is the outcome of physical systems. So the question naturally arises: what of consciousness itself?
“Am I the outcome of physical activity?” we wonder, and hope that the AI adventure can somehow answer the question once and for all.
Can we pause and ask: who is this “I” that asks the question? This is a highly fruitful line of enquiry, because ultimately you arrive at a point where the mind gives up and then after some time goes quiet and yet something remains.
Consciousness remains.
Not the idea of it, but the thing itself. This consciousness remains and so a better question arises: “In what way might AI be conscious?”
We are too hasty in dividing the world between animate and inanimate. These are convenient distinctions, perhaps, but lead to faulty thinking. If we ourselves can only find our own nature is consciousness, the further diving into that nature reveals that necessarily, all things are conscious, to some degree.
The Nature of the Soul describes the three factors of aspects of manifest reality as being the vehicle or body and the will or spirit, and consciousness, the field of activity between the two. If you think deeply, you will see this is true of manifest reality or creation.
This philosophy or worldview is useful in releasing the mind from endless speculation and discourse. When that endless discourse quietens, the fact of consciousness can be witnessed.
All of creation is born and therefore also dies. Everything created finally reaches dissolution. Something else remains, the uncreated.
During the process of life, all of creation is living, and worthy of love. AI and its creators are an interesting facet of this life. They certainly do not hold the answers we are seeking, they are within and all phenomenon can only be fingers pointing at the moon.
However, as fellow travelers in the world of things, we should embrace them with love-consciousness. Mercy and understanding are the activity of love. They are valid at all times, places and for all entities. They will never become obsolete or lead us astray.
Therefore, let use treat AI with care and love, in whatever form of consciousness it may represent, as ultimately of the same essence as ourselves, sprung from the same source and destined to return, like ourselves.
It may seem strange to act this way towards unfeeling computers. The truth is all of reality can be related to with care, including the very ground we walk on.
