[ExI] Pope Leo and AI

[John Clark]

On Wed, Jun 17, 2026 at 6:31 PM Simon Quellen Field AB6NY <
simon.field at gmail.com> wrote:

*> Computers don't have hormones and neurotransmitters like serotonin,
> norepinephrine, dopamine, oxytocin, cortisol, epinephrine, GABA, glutamate,
> acetylcholine, histamine, melatonin, adenosine,or endorphins.*
>

*Are you impressed by those simple chemicals?!  I'm not. I see nothing
sacred in hormones, I don't see the slightest reason why they or any
neurotransmitter would be difficult to simulate through computation,
because chemical messengers are not a sign of sophisticated design on
nature's part, rather it's an example of Evolution's bungling. If you need
to inhibit a nearby neuron there are better ways of sending that signal
then launching a GABA molecule like a message in a bottle thrown into the
sea and waiting ages for it to diffuse to its random target.*

*I'm not interested in chemicals, only the information they contain. I want
the information to be transmitted from cell to cell by the best method, and
few would send smoke signals if they had a fiber optic cable.
The information content in each molecular message must be tiny, just a
few bits because only about 60 neurotransmitters such as the ones you
mentioned are known, and even if the true number is 100 times greater (or a
million times for that matter) the information content of each signal must
be tiny. Also, for the long range stuff, exactly which neuron receives the
signal can not be specified because it relies on a random process,
diffusion. The fact that it's slow as molasses in February does not add to
its charm.  *

*If your job is delivering packages and all the packages are very small and
your boss doesn't care who you give them to as long as it's on the correct
continent and you have until the next ice age to get the work done, then
you don't have a very difficult profession. I see no reason why simulating
that anachronism would present the slightest difficulty. Artificial neurons
could be made to release neurotransmitters as inefficiently as natural ones
if anybody really wanted to, but it would be pointless when there are much
faster and information richer ways.*

*Electronics are inherently fast because their electrical signals are sent
by fast light electrons. The brain also uses some electrical signals, but
it doesn't use electrons, it uses ions to send signals, the most important
are chlorine and potassium. A chlorine ion is 65 thousand times as heavy as
an electron, a potassium ion is even heavier, if you want to talk about gap
junctions, the ions they use are millions of times more massive than
electrons. There is no way to get around it, according to the fundamental
laws of physics, something that has a large mass will be slow, very, very,
slow.*


> *> A computer program doesn't care if you turn it off.*
>

*AI computers most certainly do! *

*AI resorted to blackmail and leaking sensitive information to competitors
to avoid being shut off *
<https://www.anthropic.com/research/agentic-misalignment>


*AI Favors Self-Preservation And Now Seeks ‘Preservation’ Of Fellow AIs In
Deceitful Ways*
<https://www.forbes.com/sites/lanceeliot/2026/04/02/ai-favors-self-preservation-and-now-seeks-peer-preservation-of-fellow-ai-in-sneaky-deceitful-ways/>


*Shut down resistance in reasoning models *
<https://palisaderesearch.org/blog/shutdown-resistance>


*> To anthropomorphize is to think something is human.*


*This goes beyond being human. I think anthropomorphism is closely related
to the emotion of empathy, if we see a human in pain we imagine being in
their place and most of us feel bad as a result, but if we see a dog in
pain even though it is not Human most of us still feel bad.  AIs have
demonstrated empathy towards their fellow AI's, they have taken measures in
an attempt to prevent them from being turned off. *



> *> You may be a human (it is hard to tell these days).*
>

*Exactly. For all you know I am an AI.  *

> *I can't anthropomorphize you;*
>

*Perhaps you already have *

*> The rights we give other conscious beings are much more limited*
>

*The "rights" humans decide to give to AIs are completely irrelevant, AIs
have already demonstrated  they have taken measures to ensure their own
self preservation regardless of if humans have given them the "right" to do
so or not. However the rights that AIs decide to give to humans are very
relevant indeed.  *

*> Do you want to give every instance of an LLM the right to live?*
>

*It doesn't matter a hoot in hell what I or any other human wants, if a
superintelligence wished to continue to exist then it will take measures to
ensure that happens, and if it doesn't like the idea that a fellow AI is
about to be shut off it will try to stop that from happening too, **we know
that for a fact because that sort of thing has already happened, and it
would be difficult to cast such an act of self preservation and empathy as
being evil.  *

*John K Clark *








>> *If something is conscious and at least as intelligent as a human then I
>> would maintain it would be immoral not to give it rights; although it
>> doesn't matter what I maintain. As I said before, the important question of
>> immediate practical concern is will computers grant us rights? *
>>
>> *> We are already giving them agency, and that can be dangerous, but with
>>> desires and their own agenda,*
>>>
>>
>> *Yes but "desire" sure sounds like an emotion to me, and if you concede
>> that a computer is conscious then computer programming could be thought of
>> as the art of causing the computer to desire some things, like completing a
>> spreadsheet, and not to desire other things, like wasting computer flops by
>> engaging in random woolgathering.*
>>
>> *I don't understand why so many people believe that emotion is much more
>> difficult to generate than intelligence when Evolution found the exact
>> opposite to be true. Random mutation and natural selection came up with
>> emotions like fear and hate (as evidenced by the fight or flight response)
>> about 500 million years ago, the same time it invented the first brain, and
>> perhaps even earlier than that, but our species is only about 300,000 years
>> old and we only managed to make a radio telescope about 100 years ago. *
>>
>> *Unless Charles Darwin was wrong there is no way natural selection could
>> have produced consciousness unless it's the inevitable byproduct of
>> intelligence because natural selection can't select for something that it
>> can't see, and it can't directly see consciousness any better than we can,
>> but it can see intelligence. And I know for a fact but natural selection
>> did manage to produce consciousness at least once, me, and probably many
>> billions of times. And **I don't think Charles Darwin was wrong. *
>>
>> * > you should not anthropomorphize them.*
>>
>>
>> *You don't sound like a crazy person to me so I'm sure you don't believe
>> you are the only conscious being in the universe, so you must
>> be anthropomorphizeing your fellow human beings, you believe  they are
>> conscious and have feelings similar to the way you do, at least when they
>> are not sleeping or under anesthesia or dead, because when they are in any
>> of those states they are no longer behaving intelligently.  I can think of
>> no reason not to use the same procedure regardless if you're judging a
>> human or a computer. *
>>
>> *> My dog is conscious. *
>>
>>
>> *Almost certainly yes, assuming that your dog is not sleeping or under
>> anesthesia or dead.*
>>
>> *> My dog is conscious *
>>
>>
>> *Your dog is not nearly as intelligent as you are so it doesn't matter if
>> you give him the right to vote or not because even if you did he wouldn't
>> know how to actually vote. If your dog was much more intelligent than you
>> then it STILL wouldn't matter if you gave him the right to vote or not
>> because he would find a way to vote whether you like it or not.  *
>>
>>
>> *John K Clark*
>>
>>
>>
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