Ethics in AI Colloquium with Professor Murray Shanahan - How to Think About Large Language Models

Abstract: AI systems based on large language models have become a significant cultural phenomenon. But what is the right way to think and talk about these “exotic mind-like entities”? To what extent are concepts like understanding, thinking, and consciousness relevant? In this talk I will address these questions, appealing to the concept of role-play as a way to draw on our natural fund of folk psychological concepts without falling prey to anthropomorphism.