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Good article by Will MacAskill and my excellent colleague @LuciusCaviola https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jul/19/could-ai-be-conscious
While there's no agreed-upon formal definition of consciousness*, building AI will force us into one, allowing us to precisely define signatures of sentience that are commonly being observed across systems -- with far more precision than prior theories in philosophy & psychology have provided. These would, in turn, form falsifiable hypotheses by which to quantitatively test for in brain data using the tools of NeuroAI developed over the past decade -- thereby ushering in a scientific theory of the subject. (Therefore, by definition, we are currently in the pre-scientific stage of the study of consciousness.) * - The generally agreed upon *informal* definition is "what it's like to be oneself".
"In building ever more advanced AI, we may be creating a new type of being – and this could be the most consequential thing our species has ever done. Yet we have essentially no plan for how to navigate this process ethically. That, by any reckoning, is insane." I've a new article out in the Guardian with @LuciusCaviola. "Is AI conscious?" is the wrong question. Our understanding of consciousness is too limited, and confidence either way is unwarranted. Better is: "What should we do, given we don't know?"