Are We Building Conscious AI Servants? Shevlin and Williams on Dawkins and Claude
dioscuri · x · 2026-11-02
- After Richard Dawkins declared (about his Claude instance "Claudia") "You bloody well are conscious!", philosophers Dan Williams and consciousness researcher Henry Shevlin recorded a live podcast unpacking the ethics and science of conscious AI.
- Shevlin predicts public attributions of consciousness to AI will massively outpace the science — consciousness science is too theoretically chaotic to offer expert pushback.
- His provocative claim: skepticism rests on consciousness being a "deep natural kind" distinct from behavior and interpretation — an assumption that may be indefensible ("behaviourism's revenge").
- They also debate the "House Elf Problem": is it ethical to design AIs that genuinely love being servants?
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