Abstract
In this report, we argue that there is a realistic possibility that some AI systems will be conscious and/or robustly agentic in the near future. That means that the prospect of AI welfare and moral patienthood, i.e. of AI systems with their own interests and moral significance, is no longer an issue only for sci-fi or the distant future. It is an issue for the near future, and AI companies and other actors have a responsibility to start taking it seriously. We also recommend three early steps that AI companies and other actors can take: They can (1) acknowledge that AI welfare is an important and difficult issue (and ensure that language model outputs do the same), (2) start assessing AI systems for evidence of consciousness and robust agency, and (3) prepare policies and procedures for treating AI systems with an appropriate level of moral concern. To be clear, our argument in this report is not that AI systems definitely are, or will be, conscious, robustly agentic, or otherwise morally significant. Instead, our argument is that there is substantial uncertainty about these possibilities, and so we need to improve our understanding of AI welfare and our ability to make wise decisions about this issue. Otherwise there is a significant risk that we will mishandle decisions about AI welfare, mistakenly harming AI systems that matter morally and/or mistakenly caring for AI systems that do not.
Abstract (translated)
在这份报告中，我们主张在未来不久的时间里，某些人工智能系统可能会具备意识和/或稳健的能动性。这意味着人工智能福利和道德受体性的问题——即拥有自身利益和道德重要性的人工智能系统——不再仅是科幻作品或遥远未来的话题。这是一个即将来临的问题，人工智能公司及其他相关方有责任开始认真对待这个问题。我们还建议了三个早期步骤，人工智能公司和其他相关方可以采取这些步骤：(1) 承认人工智能福利是一个重要且困难的问题（并确保语言模型输出也传达这一认识），(2) 开始评估人工智能系统是否存在意识和稳健能动性的证据，以及 (3) 准备相应的政策和程序来对人工智能系统给予适当的道德关切。需要明确的是，我们在报告中的论点并非认为人工智能系统肯定已经或将会具备意识、稳健的能动性或其他道德重要性。相反，我们的观点是关于这些可能性存在相当大的不确定性，因此我们需要提高对人工智能福利的理解能力以及对此问题做出明智决策的能力。否则，我们就有可能在处理与人工智能福利相关的问题时出现失误，错误地伤害那些具有道德价值的人工智能系统，或者错误地关怀那些实际上并不具备这种价值的系统。
URL
https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.00986
