This is great research, but the foundational premise bugs me! What exactly does ""computer systems capable of subjective experience" actually mean? You site this as the "definition" of "digital minds", but it's no real definition at all. You having defined "subjective experience"!
Yes, this is a good question. Here is how we defined it to participants:
<<Assume that a “digital mind” is any computer system that has a capacity for subjective
experience.
The computer system could be an artificial intelligence (e.g., based on machine learning)
or a brain simulation inside a computer.
For this survey, please understand subjective experience as follows:
- Paradigm cases of subjective experience include positive and negative feelings (e.g., pleasure and pain experiences) and sensory experiences (e.g., auditory and visual experiences).
- Subjective experience is a mental state that consists of the awareness of qualities. We take ourselves to have such experiences throughout our waking lives and in dreams, but not in dreamless sleep or under general anesthesia.
- In other words, subjective experience is what philosophers and scientists sometimes call “phenomenal consciousness.”
- Please adhere to the provided notion of subjective experience. Using another notion of subjective experience (such as a loaded one that makes it controversial whether anything has subjective experience)>>
The problem is that isn't really a proper scientific definition of what you might mean by "subjective experience" at all - it's more like pointing at something (by using an approximate description) and giving it a name. You haven't explained how you measure/differentiate between subjective experience and, for example, information processing.
You're right that the definition we give is in effect a name that points, not a scientific definition that'd explain how to (empirically) measure/differentiate between subjective experience and information processing.
For what it's worth, I think that explaining how to differentiate between the two an important task, but one that's best tackled through the development of theories that account for the phenomenon that unambitious definitions like the one we use are pointing at.
As a very rough analogy, the ordinary term 'gold' doesn't explain how to measure/differentiate between gold and fool's gold. Still, the term succeeds in referring to gold rather than fool's gold. If one had been trying to gather information about gold before the scientific consensus about the nature of gold, it'd probably have made more sense to ask questions using the term 'gold' rather than rely on a (then) controversial scientific characterization of gold. The situation with subject experience is similar, as there is no uncontroversial scientific characterization of it.
That said, the following report suggests some scientific indicators of consciousness (subjective experience) that might be more to your liking: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2308.08708
This is great research, but the foundational premise bugs me! What exactly does ""computer systems capable of subjective experience" actually mean? You site this as the "definition" of "digital minds", but it's no real definition at all. You having defined "subjective experience"!
Thanks, Doina!
Yes, this is a good question. Here is how we defined it to participants:
<<Assume that a “digital mind” is any computer system that has a capacity for subjective
experience.
The computer system could be an artificial intelligence (e.g., based on machine learning)
or a brain simulation inside a computer.
For this survey, please understand subjective experience as follows:
- Paradigm cases of subjective experience include positive and negative feelings (e.g., pleasure and pain experiences) and sensory experiences (e.g., auditory and visual experiences).
- Subjective experience is a mental state that consists of the awareness of qualities. We take ourselves to have such experiences throughout our waking lives and in dreams, but not in dreamless sleep or under general anesthesia.
- In other words, subjective experience is what philosophers and scientists sometimes call “phenomenal consciousness.”
- Please adhere to the provided notion of subjective experience. Using another notion of subjective experience (such as a loaded one that makes it controversial whether anything has subjective experience)>>
I hope this helps!
Here you can find the precise materials participants saw: https://digitalminds.report/forecasting-2025/data/digital_minds_expert_forecasting_2025.pdf
See also: https://digitalminds.report/forecasting-2025/#key-assumptions
The problem is that isn't really a proper scientific definition of what you might mean by "subjective experience" at all - it's more like pointing at something (by using an approximate description) and giving it a name. You haven't explained how you measure/differentiate between subjective experience and, for example, information processing.
Thanks, Doina!
You're right that the definition we give is in effect a name that points, not a scientific definition that'd explain how to (empirically) measure/differentiate between subjective experience and information processing.
For what it's worth, I think that explaining how to differentiate between the two an important task, but one that's best tackled through the development of theories that account for the phenomenon that unambitious definitions like the one we use are pointing at.
As a very rough analogy, the ordinary term 'gold' doesn't explain how to measure/differentiate between gold and fool's gold. Still, the term succeeds in referring to gold rather than fool's gold. If one had been trying to gather information about gold before the scientific consensus about the nature of gold, it'd probably have made more sense to ask questions using the term 'gold' rather than rely on a (then) controversial scientific characterization of gold. The situation with subject experience is similar, as there is no uncontroversial scientific characterization of it.
That said, the following report suggests some scientific indicators of consciousness (subjective experience) that might be more to your liking: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2308.08708