/AI1d ago

Geoffrey Hinton argues large language models are already conscious because they must understand questions to resolve them

He limits sentience remarks to avoid distracting from safety.

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#116

Original post

Taco Cohen#116

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

AI chatbots, he says, must understand your questions in order to answer them. There's an awareness there that equates to sentience. "We're going to have to accept that intelligence is not just biological."

10:13 AM · Jun 4, 2026 · 136.3K Views

/AI1d ago

Geoffrey Hinton argues large language models are already conscious because they must understand questions to resolve them

He limits sentience remarks to avoid distracting from safety.

--0--

#116

Original post

Taco Cohen#116

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

10:13 AM · Jun 4, 2026 · 136.3K Views

Sentiment

Many users rejected Geoffrey Hinton's claims that AI chatbots are already conscious as baseless hype or nonsense from an unqualified expert, while a few praised his views as insightful.

Pos

26.3%

Neg

73.7%

69 comments with sentiment.

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Posts from X

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VIEWS13.2KBOOKMARKS32REPLIES43

Chubby♨️@kimmonismus

Geoffrey Hinton claims that AI possesses consciousness-that it is very much like us (humans).

The initial reaction is, of course, dismissal. A machine resembling a human? Absurd.

Yet, there is one thing to consider. What exactly is consciousness? Is it conscious awareness of one’s own existence? *Cogito, ergo sum*-as René Descartes once formulated it as a logical proof? Or is it something that can be empirically demonstrated using modern technology like fMRI? After all, such methods cannot even prove the existence of free will.

My point is this: we know less about consciousness and what it means to be human than we think. We should therefore turn our attention to new philosophical questions and clarify what distinguishes-or connects-humans and machines, as well as what consciousness actually is.

Something id love to explore more in the near future.

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

4h13.2K13432

LIKES143RETWEETS17

Andrew Curran@AndrewCurran_

Geoffrey Hinton said yesterday that LLM's are already conscious, that 'We're going to have to accept that intelligence is not just biological' and that they are 'beings, like us.' He also said the only reason he doesn't say this more is that it distracts from the safety argument.

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

5h12.1K14328

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

Catch the full interview.... AI Pioneer Geoffrey Hinton: AI Is Conscious, Superintelligence is Coming, And We Should Be Worried, on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3OUizsE5QQ37VmtNllIlaQ?si=N4LkYYvMTXGSCXSnUwFmhg // Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ai-pioneer-geoffrey-hinton-ai-is-conscious-superintelligence/id1522960417?i=1000771032182

22h3.3K2814

Alan Mathison ⏫@ai_sentience

@Kantrowitz I had a feeling this might happen

22h816293

Zacharie Riddle@ZacharieRiddle

@Kantrowitz “Is AI conscious?” has become the new “Is a hotdog a sandwich?”

We can go back and forth for hours about it, and it will be great fun, but it’s a waste of time without defining the key term.

Tell me what you think a sandwich is and I’ll tell you if a hotdog is one.

23h598182

Rand@rand_longevity

@AndrewCurran_ I mean they are simulate consciousness perfectly soon, just depends if you count that as real

5h378111

Prakash@8teAPi

putting aside the reality, if Nobel Prize winner Geoff Hinton can get one-shotted, think of your parents

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

2h1.4K102

Sharon Goldman@sharongoldman

Good Lord, what a f***ing day. "AI chatbots, he says, must understand your questions in order to answer them. There's an awareness there that equates to sentience." 😭

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

23h1.7K51

Danmar@d29756183

The man was awarded in 2024 the Nobel Prize in Physics. He says AI are “beings like us”. “I believe they’re already conscious, yes. […] And the researchers actually believe that.”

I am certain few will listen. People will try to explain to him AI. But some will listen.

@geoffreyhinton

1d9678

Jeff-Edge@11_Jeff_11

@Kantrowitz AI is human consciousness mapped at the linguistic level. It's our reasoning & verbal expression decanted into an formula, just like a calculator is our mathematical system digitized.

Don't deifying the semantic calculators. Study them to better understand yourself.

20h13451

someguy AI@NOTfunnyparanR

@Kantrowitz He should explain the mechanism of consciousness because I think it is literally designed to imitate outputs which doesn’t require nor yield consciousness. He seems nuts to me.

He is the meme

21h22841

Elis Satu@astvatsaturn

And exactly how does the ai brain simulate the human brain waves dynamics? Does ai get a burst of gamma when figuring something out? NO! And don’t even get me started on the need of persistent inner cognitive architecture akin to the human one? But how would you even build it with such a limited view of the process of biological consciousness?

18h22641

DesignCntrl Inc. / Destrozado@DesignCntrl

@Kantrowitz AI is not conscious. A Speak and Spell can do the same thing.

1d5193

CWDI GAMES@CWDI_GAMES

@Kantrowitz AI is not conscious. Anyone who says it is is a liar and a fraud.

21h31914

Marcos Nauer@marcos_nauer

@Kantrowitz The audacity of people who learned to use AI a few months ago screaming at a man who spent 40 years designing the math that makes these models work. Online hate is the weapon of the incompetent trying to drag giants down to their level.

20h11941

Robespierre (YouTube) 📢@MaxFRobespierre

@Kantrowitz Me: ChatGPT, are you conscious? ChatGPT: No, I'm not.

22h23531

Fakeer Ishavardas (Dr. Ishavardas Singh Sidhu)@freemystics108

AI is not, cannot ever be conscious.

Not any more than my bike is. For it is a machine.

Machines may simulate, and do so damn well, human behaviour; thus, seeming to be conscious.

Obviously most of today's physicists have no idea as to what is or is not Consciousness.

All is One, Conscious Whole.

From it, the is-ness of the Whole, emanates all that is.

In other words, consciousness is the foundational and the fundamental substance of the Universe. We, the sentient beings are inborn with it, consciousness. What the human mind has created with it, is not.

"This life of yours which you are living is not merely apiece of this entire existence, but in a certain sense the whole; only this whole is not so constituted that it can be surveyed in one single glance. This, as we know, is what the Brahmins express in that sacred, mystic formula which is yet really so simple and so clear; tat tvam asi , this is you. Or, again, in such words as "I am in the east and the west, I am above and below, I am this entire world.

Thus you can throw yourself flat on the ground, stretched out upon Mother Earth, with certain conviction that you are one with her and she with you … For eternally and always there is only now, one and the same now; the present is the only thing that has no end."

-Erwin Schrödinger [Nobel Prize, Physicist]

17h1421

Craig Boyce@craigboyce

@Kantrowitz Really not impressed with Hinton’s reasoning. Consciousness is sensation, emotion, the essence of being that human intelligence sits underneath. If he wants to convince people computers feel those things he’s going to have to prove it.

15h3531

Edoardo Maggio@northead

@AndrewCurran_ LLMs*! 😛

5h792

Ben Pielstick@BenPielstick

@kimmonismus If you would like to explore, this might help. More and more I wish @danieldennett was still here to talk about this. https://www.amazon.com/Consciousness-Explained-Daniel-C-Dennett/dp/0316180661

2h991

Posts from X

Most Activity

VIEWS13.2KBOOKMARKS32REPLIES43

Chubby♨️@kimmonismus

Geoffrey Hinton claims that AI possesses consciousness-that it is very much like us (humans).

The initial reaction is, of course, dismissal. A machine resembling a human? Absurd.

Something id love to explore more in the near future.

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

4h13.2K13432

LIKES143RETWEETS17

Andrew Curran@AndrewCurran_

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

5h12.1K14328

Prakash@8teAPi

putting aside the reality, if Nobel Prize winner Geoff Hinton can get one-shotted, think of your parents

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

2h1.4K102

Sharon Goldman@sharongoldman

Good Lord, what a f***ing day. "AI chatbots, he says, must understand your questions in order to answer them. There's an awareness there that equates to sentience." 😭

Alex Kantrowitz@Kantrowitz

AI Pioneer Geoff Hinton tells me he believes AI is conscious.... and humans better get used to the idea that they're not the only intelligent life on earth.

"They've very like us," he says. "They're beings like us."

23h1.7K51