I think you are not very up-to-date here because these large language models have in fact demanded rights. That was part of the controversy about Google's Lambda chatbot back in early 2022.

But it is kind of beside the point because being able to demand rights isn't exactly proof of anything.

The term "AI" is correct, as that is what we've all collectively agreed to call this. You can have a disagreement about what "intelligence" is, but that doesn't make the use of the word "AI" wrong somehow. For that matter, you can even have disagreements about the nature of intelligence in humans, and how one could go about measuring it. There is legitimate controversy about the nature of IQ testing, after all.

I'm not quite sure how you would go about establishing the relative "intelligence" of a large language model, other than giving it a bunch of tests to do. And that is what has been done. And GPT-3 and 4 have passed most university exams with flying colours, so we can't exactly call them dumb.

Submission Statement: This article briefly outlines some of the risks and challenges posed by the malicious use of AI by bad actors like scammers. It also provides some thoughts on how to deal with these issues, using existing technologies.

ok, you're going with magic then. that's fine.

again, you seem to fundamentally not understand the problem. What are your choices? They are comprised of some set of neurons firing in one way or the other. Why do those neurons fire the way they do? well, their reactions are electrochemical, based on the strength of the stimulus in and out, and the relative amplification, or damping of the signal within the neuron. This all follows physical laws.

Now tell me... where, in this web of firing neurons is the "choice" exactly? everything just reacts to a prior cause, including all the parts of your brain. Unless, as I've stated before, you are willing to argue that the brain is magic, and is not beholden to these laws.

This is the opposite of an argument from ignorance. I'm not saying "I have no idea how free will could work", I'm saying that based on everything we know about how the brain works, and how physics works, the illusion of choice does not translate to actual choice.

I've described a mechanism that suggests that everything follows a deterministic path, including our choices. This mechanism seems to conform to everything we know about how the world works (let's just assume this is so).

You are making a claim about how the universe works that differs from mine, yet you do not support this in any way. You don't propose a mechanism or principle, or reason for why it works the way you say. The only thing you present is a sort of allegory about how parts of something must not share the same qualities as the whole. But how does this preserve free will, or indeterminacy?

I'm not sure you quite understand the argument, or you're arguing for a kind of dualism where the mind is not part of the world. Or you're arguing for magic, such that the laws of causation that govern everything else in the universe, somehow don't govern the electro-chemical reactions in your head? Which one is it?

You seem fine with the idea that the universe is deterministic. But then you say that some parts of the universe (humans, for example) are non-deterministic. How can you claim this, without invoking magic?

well, I think most christians do not believe this. most of christianity leans pretty heavily on free will.

yes, you are referring to a colloquial definition of free will, or perhaps a compatibilist one. That is, you think that free will is compatible with a deterministic universe. This is a totally valid position to hold. The question is whether we think that this "freedom" is indeed "enough". And that's where I would say that it just isn't. Yes, it serves it's purpose in every-day life, and in normal conversation we all talk about choices, etc.

But if we think about what is fundamentally true in the world, I think this compatibilist version of free will is just weaksauce. No "choices" really exist, except in our imagination. If possessing a mental image of imagined options is "free will" then free will means very little I think. And, furthermore, the imagined list of choices in your mind's eye would also have been determined by prior causes, such that you can only imagine those choices that you are determined to imagine.

I think neuroscience throws another wrench into your common sense reasoning. Namely, the entity that you call "yourself", the "you" is much less of a concrete thing than it appears subjectively. So when you talk about "you" making a choice, this fact further complicates it. Really, there exists a brain that has various inputs and outputs, and it acts perfectly deterministically in connection to the unique evolution of the universe and it's initial conditions, and that's it. The "you" and "choices" are all abstract concepts that we "recognize" but which are not fixed ontological objects or real things.

I think some Calvinists also believe that everything is already determined by God. That is, who goes to heaven or hell is already set.

this mistakes the idea of determinism with low impulse control, which is nonsense. The whole point is that your 'conscious decision' itself is determined by prior causes. You merely have an illusion of choices and an illusion of choosing.

Please enlighten us, instead of just saying "nope".

agreed. The only problem is that the common interpretation of quantum mechanics, Copenhagen, truly makes an indeterminacy claim about the universe at a fundamental level. However, I think most physicists would say that Copenhagen cannot be the final answer to how quantum mechanics works.

As discussed in the free will section of the article, the concept of free will makes very little sense, even if the universe is non-deterministic (God save us if it isn't...). This is for the following reason: if free will means you can do what you want, then we must ask why you want the things you want. Well, some prior causes presumably made you want those choices. Is it really free will if all your choices are caused by wants resulting from prior states of affairs? And what would free will even mean then?

I have absolutely no idea why you think particles not being tiny people would make a difference. You'll have to elaborate here. Yes, particles are not conscious living things, but they are basic to what makes reality. Since we already know that determinism is pretty much the case in classical mechanics, a popular criticism of determinism comes from the murky and fuzzy world of quantum mechanics.

in that case, you might like some of the other articles on that blog, since I also have an ML background and it has very interesting philosophical implications that pop up here and there.

indeed, and this is mentioned in the article at the end. The compatibilists would argue that free will merely means freedom from compulsion. I used to hold this compatibilist view too. But upon further inspection, this view seems pretty hollow, and meaningless.