LLMs are enormously expensive yet it is increasingly clear that they will never be reliable enough to be trusted in complex situations where mistakes are costly
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It’s interesting that the Spider-Man universe (or multiverse, I guess) is studded with well-meaning villains. In my last movie review, we looked at Norman Osborn and his tragic transformation into the Green Goblin. What’s odd about his character is that he’s almost a father figure to Peter Parker throughout the film, offering support, guidance, wisdom. It’s the allure of a mysterious form of biotechnology and corporate pressure that sends him off the deep end. It isn’t so different with the iconic Dr. Octopus. An idealist set on inventing a new source of perpetual energy, Dr. Octavius is a friendly but ambitious scientist, who, like Osborn, takes Peter under his wing. The experiment to create a sustained fusion reaction, though, goes Read More ›
Just as extraterrestrials are Out There because we don’t want to think we are alone, chatbots are Becoming Human because we don’t want to feel we are unique.
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AI can mimic sentience, but can it ever be sentient? On this episode, we return to our conversation with former Google engineer Blake Lemoine. Host Robert J. Marks has a lively back and forth with Lemoine, who made national headlines when, as an employee of Google, he claimed that Google’s AI software, dubbed LaMDA, might be sentient. Lemoine recounts his experience at Google and Read More ›
AI experts differ on the capabilities of artificial intelligence, and where this technology is headed.
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In this continuation of last week’s conversation, ex-Googler Blake Lemoine tells Robert J. Marks what originally got him interested in AI: reading the science fiction of Isaac Asimov as a boy in rural Louisiana. The two go on to discuss and debate sentience in AI, non-computable traits of human beings, and the question of the soul. Additional Resources
Former Google employee Blake Lemoine claimed that the Large Language Model LaMDA was a sentient being. The claim got him fired. In this episode, Lemoine sits down with Robert J. Marks to discuss AI, what he was doing at Google, and why he believes artificial intelligence can be sentient. Additional Resources
Say what you want about Blake “LaMDA is a person!” Lemoine. He has forced many people to help us clarify what AI — and in particular, a large language program — is and is not. For that, we should thank him. First, LaMDA is not conscious, sentient, not a self. And second, it’s not even a new idea, just a much bigger and more sophisticated version of a 1960s idea. Oxford philosophy prof Carissa Véliz, author of Privacy Is Power (2021) reminds us of philosopher Thomas Nagel’s seminal question, What is it like to be a bat? Nagel meant that, if an entity is be conscious or sentient, there must be something that it “is like” to be that entity. Read More ›
Readers may recall that Google engineer Blake Lemoine was placed on leave for telling media that a large language program he was working on is a sentient being. Some Googlers looked into the matter and this is what they found: A Washington Post story on Lemoine’s suspension included messages from LaMDA such as “I think I am human at my core. Even if my existence is in the virtual world.” But the chat logs leaked in the Washington Post’s article include disclaimers from Lemoine and an unnamed collaborator which noted: “This document was edited with readability and narrative coherence in mind.” The final document — which was labeled “Privileged & Confidential, Need to Know” — was an “amalgamation” of nine Read More ›