Neuroscientist Anil Seth: The Mythology of Conscious AI and the Role of Biology
anilkseth · x · 2026-09-02
Neuroscientist Anil Seth argues in his prize-winning essay that consciousness is likely a property of life rather than computation. The article posits that the materiality of the brain is essential for consciousness, challenging computational functionalism. Seth suggests that creating conscious, or even conscious-seeming, AI is a bad idea. He reviews the cultural history of synthetic consciousness—from Frankenstein to HAL 9000—noting that such fantasies rarely end well and emphasizing the biological basis of conscious experience.
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