“Artificial Consciousness and Human-Robot Interaction”

When we want to force artificial intelligence to be equal to humans, the results are much poorer than when we want them to simply do some task.

Human beings have created various humanoid robots whose artificial intelligence allows them to perform mechanical activities and even simulate a certain level of consciousness and feelings.

Dr. Carlos hen’s son, a researcher at UNAM’s Institute for Applied Mathematics and Systems Research (IIMAS), talks about these machines created with characteristics similar to ours.

In 1921, the Czech writer  Capek coined the word robot. Automata were built before, dolls with some very basic behavior. In 1956, shortly after the first digital computers were built, talk of artificial intelligence (AI) began.

Types of artificial intelligence:

For Ger-shen son there are different types of AI or ways of classifying it:

1. Artificial intelligence systems in software.
2. AI in hardware, which is basically robots. The ones with humanoid forms are crude imitations of what almost any animal can do.
3. AI for the symbolic representation of knowledge and management of logical rules.
4. AI uses models that are known as “connectionists” and are abstractions similar to the properties those nervous systems have.

There is artificial intelligence that does “things that we are not good at”. They have different applications and it is difficult to say that one is better than the other, because each one is good for certain tasks.

However, “when we want to force them to be the same as humans, the results are much poorer than when we want the machines to simply do some task.”

Emotions modulate behavior:

A Google cha-bot said he was afraid of death. Is it possible for an AI to have consciousness and feelings?

Depending on what we understand by conscience and feelings. Marvin Min-sky, considered one of the founders of AI by books such as The Society of Mind, argues:

The question is not whether an intelligent machine can have feelings, but whether a machine can be intelligent if it does not have feelings.

Emotions can be seen as modulators of behavior, whether in an animal, a person, or a machine. Your reaction to a situation will depend in part on your emotion.

Reacting in one way or another according to emotion is part of the flexibility of intelligence. Several applications consider this postulate.

The IIMAS researcher adds that, on the one hand, they simulate emotions in artificial systems; on the other hand, through the “affective computing” conversation, they try to detect the emotions of users to better interact with them.

Imitation of consciousness:
There is no consensus on what consciousness is. In general, it is having a certain perception of the environment. But we must not confuse this ability to feel – feeling hungry, hot or cold – with self-awareness – I reflect on who I am and what I do in this world.

“Is relatively easier to reproduce, but self-awareness is not only more difficult to replicate in artificial systems, but even to define in humans.”

The scientific community agrees that in the responses of the Google LaMDA chatbot “there is really no awareness. It’s just an imitation.”
Chat bots, in particular, basically generalize from patterns they detect in the data we train them with.
They’re built to give us the impression that they’re having a useful or interesting conversation, but it’s not like there’s anything else behind it; They are unaware.