Three reasons AI is not conscious and may never be, per Nature essay
anilkseth · x · 2026-10-21
Neuroscientist Anil Seth, philosopher Ned Block, and consciousness researcher Giulio Tononi argue in a Nature comment that LLMs' uncanny mimicry of thought and feeling doesn't imply subjective experience — intelligence alone is insufficient for consciousness.
- Key contrast: nobody worries AlphaFold "might be conscious" because it only predicts protein structures; LLMs "talk" to us, and linguistic fluency creates a compelling illusion of consciousness that is purely behavioral mimicry.
- The essay lays out three neuroscience-based reasons why AI is not conscious and perhaps never will be.
More from AGI Musings
- a16z: Superhuman AI hardware design is the easy part — manufacturing is the hard one — a16z · 2026-10-21
- a16z's Casado says AI can't do a VC's job — but it can do everything around it — alvelda · 2026-10-21
- Kent Beck: Let the Genie Carry the Toil, But Keep the Struggle — josh_wills · 2026-10-21
- Nearly $3B mapped: the money behind the AI existential risk ecosystem — KeyNaive2982 · 2026-10-21
- Everything in AI is downstream of a global status graph, says founder — gabriel1 · 2026-10-21
- Should Claims That AI Agents Aren't Humanlike Carry a Burden of Proof? — davidmanheim · 2026-10-21