Google fires employee who claimed AI system had become sentient

[Magical Realist]

Sounds like the beginning to a sci fi horror movie..

https://www.azfamily.com/2022/07/26/goog...DXWs17zYOk

"Google has fired the engineer who claimed an unreleased artificial intelligence system called LaMDA has become sentient.

The company said Blake Lemoine violated employment and data security policies.

The software engineer claimed the conversation technology had reached a level of consciousness after he exchanged thousands of messages with it.

Google first put him on leave in June.

The company said it reviewed his sentient claims extensively and determined they were wholly unfounded.

Google said it takes the development of AI “very seriously” and that it’s committed to “responsible innovation.”

LaMDA stands for “language model for dialog applications.”

The wider AI community has held that LaMDA is not near a level of consciousness."

[Leigha]

Reminds me of the sci-fi movie, Her.

I think the main reason for his suspension is that he took proprietary info and published it for others to see, not just the claim itself. I think the best way to test ''sentience'' with chatbots and AI of any kind, is to simply leave ''them'' alone for a while...and see what happens. If they're not ''provoked,'' see how they ''behave.''

There's a lot of scare quotes in this post, not sure why, but I felt they were needed. lol

Not that I'm pro-government control, but I think the government needs to have some oversight into these big tech companies, because who knows where this leads. Imagine weaponizing AI. Stranger things...

[Zinjanthropos]

The capacity to experience emotions/sensations is often attributed to certain levels of intelligence. A vegan might say anything with a brain or central nervous system is sentient. I would assume then that Google is not doubting their machine is intelligent, just that this AI is an intelligence without feelings or cannot experience them. Question is whether it's fair to fire a guy because he expressed an opinion about intelligent machines, whereas someone who believes there are also intelligent UAP's overhead is allowed to carry on?

Hope the guy sues for wrongful dismissal. I guess Google is saying he isn't crazy. Like some Catch 22. Crazy assertions can get a guy fired but it's not crazy to assert....something like that.