[slfnflctd]

> this is presumably written by technical folks, who know how these systems actually work, and should know better than to use such anthropomorphic, magicalhocus-pocus terminology

I get your point. But regardless of whether we can definitively establish if any of these Generative AI LLM agents are conscious (we cannot, because we can't even say the same of our fellow humans, see Philosophical Zombies), the bigger issue which we are already in the midst of is that many people believe and behave as if they were, and how that downstream behavior has very real consequences in our world which cannot be ignored.

The results of people anthropomorphizing needs to be dealt with more than the actual process itself (which we have no way to stop anyhow).

These agents have mostly conquered the realm of intelligent-seeming expression of complex ideas through language. Speaking about their actions in terms of ethical concepts is not only appropriate, but necessary.