[esafak]

In movies r̶o̶b̶o̶t̶s̶ AIs have delivered speeches on the meaning of life too:

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tears_in_rain_monologue

[manytimesaway]

Replicants are not robots, and are arguably not AI. LLMs aren't AI either, but once the bullshit's out of the bag...

[teaearlgraycold]

AI can be anything from depth first search to superhuman intelligence on a chip. I like to refer to it as automated statistics.

[treyd]

They literally say in the opening text crawl that replicants are genetically engineered from humans. A major theme through the movie is that they're like humans, are built to have the thoughts/emotions of humans (even if experienced in the context of implanted memories), but they can never really be humans because they're synthetic and engineered to have the traits they do and die an early death.

Robots and AI do not experience and interact with the world in a way that's comparable to humans. We don't yet have the epistemological framework to reckon with what it means to consciously experience reality in a non-biological entity, but we do know that it will be alien and unlike human cognition.

Replicants have the same biology and cognition as humans, so we can relate to them and them to us, which puts the scenario in a different context.

[derbOac]

The Tears in Rain monologue occurred to me as well while I was reading the post, but I don't think it's quite the same for one important reason: the replicants have experienced those things and processed them in whatever sense it is, but LLM-style AIs as we have them now are always inferring what those experiences are like.

If you had a fully functioning model in some setting, interacting with the environment and then reporting back to you about it, it might be one thing. But telling you what others have said about it is different.

Humans do this too, but there's real-life experiences informing it also. An LLM hasn't fell in love, it simply reports what others have said and infers what it is like to be in love.

I think too the piece points to another related thing, which is that someone who has actually experienced something firsthand has some knowledge that someone who has not does not. It might take some extensive sampling to find out what that is, but eventually you'll stumble on it.

So e.g., the Sistine Chapel example is sort of telling in this way. Sean basically says "everyone has seen pictures of the Sistine Chapel, if you are asked about it you can tell me what it looks like" but then points out that people don't talk about what it smells like, so if you had been there you might remember it. It's a bit of latent or hidden information, kind of like a secret key, but one that might be informative or useful in some unexpected scenario.

I think ultimately this is what the stochastic parrot idea is about: it's not just about mimicking speech patterns, it's about regurgitating what is said about X from third party Z, without being able to produce some additional information not available from Z except by inference. There's no original uninferred information. The inferences might be powerful and highly accurate in their predictions, but they are not providing anything fundamentally original from the experience in a memory sense.

Maybe that's what it is? LLMs have no firsthand memories, they only have secondhand memories and inference. They're missing information that would be available through firsthand memories, constrained by the scope of sensory channels.

Again, I think you could envision models in some system that are essentially replicant-like, but that's not what our current situation is with standard LLMs.

[kQq9oHeAz6wLLS]

I, Robot (2004) dealt with this issue, too

Human beings have dreams. Even dogs have dreams, but not you, you are just a machine. An imitation of life. Can a robot write a symphony? Can a robot turn a... canvas into a beautiful masterpiece?

[derektank]

After which of course, Sonny the robot guilelessly asks the detective, somewhat in awe, “Can you?”

[jimbokun]

You know the actor playing the part of the robot was a human being…right?

[NopIdoN]

according to him

[bryanrasmussen]

wait, he has officially made a statement?

[NopIdoN]

no, you're right: we don't even have his word for it