On Wednesday, September 02, 2026, at 2:22 PM, Matt Mahoney wrote: > Instead of asking if rocks or LLMs or insects are conscious, ask if they have > feelings. Rocks do not. Animals have many feelings in common with humans. > LLMs predict text, which means they can model all the human emotions, knowing > how words affect feelings and feelings affect words. If an LLM is programmed > to carry out in real time what it predicts a human would do, such as in the > Turing test, then it is indistinguishable from having feelings.
That’s the first-person view. We’re not isolated entities we are systems. That’s how systems cohere, by symbolizing and communicating qualia since we can’t fully model ourselves individually. Insect qualia have different transmission protocol, they group differently. Various types of intelligences group differently. Homogenous biologic species may not increase intelligence much since a distributed intelligence needs variance in consciousness to cope with environmental differences as a system optimization. Stratifications form in humans and AI agents also. Some humans communicate telepathically some don’t. Ones that do it well may get conscripted at a young age (Gate Program) and work for national intelligence agencies. Technologies exist to transfer a human consciousness to another body. People that receive heart transplants have feelings of the original body since the heart itself has a brain. Gut macrobiota also is a brain and that can effect consciousness of the system directing the primary brain for food supply. While you can look at all this as feelings there is much more going on system-wide. Cultures that crafted exquisite stone monoliths with such great care existed in the past and may have enhanced the consciousness of the whole society verses crushing them like some other cultures where consciousness is controlled and suppressed. ------------------------------------------ Artificial General Intelligence List: AGI Permalink: https://agi.topicbox.com/groups/agi/T906c878e4ba411be-M7297d533b9c6f06a731ec9fa Delivery options: https://agi.topicbox.com/groups/agi/subscription
