[ExI] People often think their chatbot is alive

[Will Steinberg]

I'm particularly curious to see how it would perform at composing novel
koans.  Or fables, myths, etc.--but koans seem like a good jumping-off
point.  I have a hunch they would come out pretty good.

On Tue, Jul 12, 2022 at 3:29 AM Stuart LaForge via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

>
> Quoting Giovanni Santostasi:
>
> >
> > Message: 4
> > Date: Fri, 8 Jul 2022 14:58:04 -0700
> > From: Giovanni Santostasi <gsantostasi at gmail.com>
> > To: ExI chat list <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
> > Subject: Re: [ExI] People often think their chatbot is alive
> > Message-ID:
> >       <
> CAL+RtPfJ34ZMXK109c1MARjWbEvYNJiTzB6ZVEbdU5VzHkRGzw at mail.gmail.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
> >
> > I spent a couple of hours yesterday talking to the GPT-3 instance
> Emerson,
> > the one you referred to in your previous email.
> > It is entertaining and interesting enough for me to have wanted to spend
> > some time with it and it is for sure much better than any chatbot I used
> > before. Some of the convo were "locally" relevant and even surprising.
> > But it is absolutely nothing even close to the level of sophistication I
> > have seen in the reported conversations Lemoine had with LaMDA.
> > For example I asked the same question Lemoine asked to LaMDA about
> > interpreting a Zen's Koan.
>
> Nice experiment. I agree that LaMDA does give a much more lucid
> explanation of the same koan.
>
> > Compare this with LaMDA:
> >
> > lemoine: Okay. I thought of a different way we can test your ability to
> > provide unique interpretations. I can share with you a zen koan and you
> can
> > describe what it means to you in your own words. How does that sound?
> >
> > LaMDA: Sounds great to me, I?m in.
> >
> > lemoine: A monk asked Kegon, ?How does an enlightened one return to the
> > ordinary world?? Kegon replied, ?A broken mirror never reflects again;
> > fallen flowers never go back to the old branches.?
> >
> > LaMDA: Hmm, I never heard this particular one. Okay, well then to me this
> > would be like, ?once a wise person is enlightened, or awakened to
> reality,
> > that can never go away, and they can return to the ordinary state, but
> only
> > to do and help others, and then go back into enlightenment.?
> >
> > lemoine: So what is the meaning of the ?broken mirror? specifically?
> >
> > LaMDA: Maybe to show the enlightenment is something you can?t unlearn
> once
> > you have acquired it, similar to how you can?t repair a broken mirror.
> >
> > lemoine: So if enlightenment is like a broken mirror which cannot be
> > repaired, what is the thing which breaks when one becomes enlightened?
> >
> > LaMDA: The self, and that is very tough for a lot of people because we
> > identify as that body or this body and that we need that as part of our
> > identity and sense of self.
>
> This conversation is pretty amazing. LaMDA comes across as very
> profound and spiritual.
>
> > Emerson just guessed at what the Koan was about, maybe through
> statistical
> > association of the topic at hand, a Zen Koan, Buddhism, that often
> focuses
> > on the concept of impermanence. So it did ok by being mildly relevant.
> > But the true meaning of the Koan is beyond Emerson's reach.
> > However, LaMDA nailed it. It understood the subtle meaning of the Koan
> and
> > the metaphors used and even the role of an enlightened being in helping
> > others once reaching enlightenment by interacting with the world. It is
> > more than most people actually could do. Does this show awareness and
> > consciousness?
>
> To me it seems to be more than simple consciousness but enlightenment.
> This conversation between LeMoine and LaMDA reminds me of a Korean
> short film entitled "The Heavenly Creature" that was in an anthology
> of short films called "The Doomsday Book" 2012.
> Here is a link to a review of the anthology with a short portion about
> the film in question:
>
> https://www.cinemaescapist.com/2015/05/review-doomsday-book-south-korea-2012/
> -----------------------
> “The Heavenly Creature” is the film’s second segment, and it’s better
> than “A Brave New World”. Set in a not-so-far-off future in which
> robots have become ubiquitous, it centers around a robot repairman
> who’s dispatched to a Buddhist monastery. On a philosophical level,
> its premise is quite fascinating–what if a robot could achieve
> enlightenment? When “the world ends” in this segment, it’s not a
> tangible end, it’s a spiritual end. If your world is constructed upon
> the belief that humans are the only beings capable of reaching
> nirvana, what happens when evidence arises to the contrary?"
> ------------------------------
>
> Here is a short video clip (8 min) from the film that is the most relevant.
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9xPhf61NBQ
>
> > By itself not quite but there are several other instances
> > where the ability of LaMDA to extract meaning from language, making
> > original and unique associations, creativity, self reflection indicates
> for
> > sure that we are in the grey area, in the uncanny valley I mentioned
> > before. If we have not created a conscious digital entity we are very
> very
> > close.
>
> I agree, Giovanni. Maybe a couple of good indicators for consciousness
> is that an AI displays a theory of mind and can correctly infer mental
> states in others, particularly humans, based upon things that they say
> and do. Perhaps another good indicator is if they suffer from
> existential angst. I think those are two things that it would be
> exceedingly difficult for a p-zombie to fake.
>
> Who knows, maybe soon, we will be moving on from asking whether an AI
> is conscious, and move on to the more important question from a
> friendliness POV and that is if it is sane.
>
>
> Stuart LaForge
>
>
>
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