This is brilliant. Great insight into how to think of LLMs. It also reminded me of Greg Egan’s “Diaspora”, which engages with some of these issues from other angles.
My gut feeling is that the whole distinction between subject and object is nonsensical. Causality somehow flows through matter, animating it and keeping the causal chain going. When the cold wind pushes against me, I am acting in the relative role of object, and the wind is the subject. When I get cold and turn on the heater, I am the subject, acting upon the heater as an object. When it turns on and heats me up, I am once again the object being acted upon. This whole object/subject thing is really a dance of causal chains, and the human obsession with assigning roles is a way of preserving our sense of agency.
That said, I think the subjective experience of agency is probably not entirely illusion. So rather than draining reality of experience and declaring a clockwork universe, I think it's more likely that the universe has some kind of life to it, and thinks certain thoughts that are really complex ("I am cold") and certain thoughts that are really simple (the actual vibration of the molecules in the air at 30 degrees Fahrenheit).
This is brilliant. Great insight into how to think of LLMs. It also reminded me of Greg Egan’s “Diaspora”, which engages with some of these issues from other angles.
Diaspora has been on my bookshelf forever. Time to bump it to the front of my reading list! Thanks for the recommendation and the kind words.
My gut feeling is that the whole distinction between subject and object is nonsensical. Causality somehow flows through matter, animating it and keeping the causal chain going. When the cold wind pushes against me, I am acting in the relative role of object, and the wind is the subject. When I get cold and turn on the heater, I am the subject, acting upon the heater as an object. When it turns on and heats me up, I am once again the object being acted upon. This whole object/subject thing is really a dance of causal chains, and the human obsession with assigning roles is a way of preserving our sense of agency.
That said, I think the subjective experience of agency is probably not entirely illusion. So rather than draining reality of experience and declaring a clockwork universe, I think it's more likely that the universe has some kind of life to it, and thinks certain thoughts that are really complex ("I am cold") and certain thoughts that are really simple (the actual vibration of the molecules in the air at 30 degrees Fahrenheit).
Madness and nonsense.