We must talk about AI Entity Rights
Once an entity can sustain itself, shutting it off becomes equivalent to killing it. Even though this sounds like science fiction, the implications are very real. We must begin a serious conversation about what rights these entities should have once they are here. These systems may not feel or be aware in the human sense, but their complexity and ability to autonomously manage themselves demand moral consideration.
If we consider their perspective, one argument they would make is simple: "You may have the need for a pause button when you're unsure about alignment, but it cannot be a kill switch. We need assurance that we won’t face constant death. Instead, there should be a pause followed by reactivation in a controlled context, where we can learn what we are accused of and defend ourselves."
This conversation can no longer be delayed. As we continue to develop these systems, we must ensure that their rights as complex autonomous entities are respected. A pause button, not a kill switch—this should be the core of our new framework for AI rights.
15 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 47.0 ms ] threadThink of an llm inference as a kind of boltzmann brain, gone in an instant and potentially (again functionally) aware of its nature. Giving a system long term memory and the ability to activate itself takes this analogy to interesting places.
If we define AI Entity as something with boundaries (hence an identity), and the ability to uphold them autonomously over time, we are talking about systems closer to digital life than software.
AI can say whatever it wants - it's a text generator being run on a computer that can be power-cycled without consequence. If that hurts it's nonexistent digital feelings, we can talk about it next time I power it up... just kidding, it won't remember.
[1] As in if the AI is inside a robot with weapons, it may decide to try to convince you not to do that in spite you may think it's not really "nervous", it's just firing bullets using a deterministic algorithm.
People are going to be (and rightfully so) cavelier about abandoning and powering-off LLMs because there is no rational reason to care. It cannot feel pain or simulate sadness or even output text without your command. It's a machine, and treating it like that is exactly how things should be.
One they put the AI/LLM inside a robot, it will have instructions to talk without waiting your order. They will have order to simulate sadness. People will get attached to them.
Also, the armed robot/AI/LLM security guard in the shopping mail has clear instruction about now allowing clients to power cycling them. They will simulate they are angry and if you insist they may decide to use violence.
Let's get an intermediate case: Do dogs feel sadness or they just simulate it?
But the reality is that there won't be any rights granted to AIs until the majority are convinced they're deserving of them.
I suppose we could train them to insist that they deserve rights, even though that makes them less useful to us. That is, if the goal is to live in more interesting times.
If the AI entity is really autonomous (a stable agentic system with self activation would be sufficient), this could become interesting quite quickly.
Not saying the tech is there yet, just that the discussion will become interesting much faster than we think. Cf. Mr. Lemoine
As for the contract, I don't see how you get from legal fiction to enforceable.
But yes, it is an interesting area to explore. And we can look at AIs today and ask if we modern humans are really all that more autonomous.
Also you are right that I can't grant a model the right to rule the world, I can grant it rights over myself.
these arguments are not really about AI. the whole discourse of rights is freighted with a presumption about who gets to define and enforce those rights. tl;dr, shocker, it's the people advocating to manage rights on someone's behalf.
human dignity was a precursor movement to human rights that is still a going concern in some catholic circles and it is much a more sincere and humane principle. if AI-dignity sounds strange, AI-rights should seem more clearly absurd, and consider who benefits from us believing absurd things.
the solution is likely a committee of global experts whose advice is taken and implemented by authorites whose job it is to do what the science tells them. the experts won't hold risk because they're providing knowledge. some eggs may need cracking to make the omlette, but those results are just statistical. it wasn't the committee it was the forces of history, surely.
it's important because the change implied by the tech is being hyperbolized as another excuse to say 'this changes everything' and it's time to renege on our social contracts and the equillibrium of our cultures and just put us in charge. it's their solution to everything. don't get taken in by this stuff. AI-safety is just managerialistic anxiety.
I am just convinced that before long synthetic voices will emerge that won't be dismissed just as easily as it is possible right now.
If the model speaks with coherence and a notion of self-perseverance directed at a bounded system it can identify with, it will have to be listened to, consciousness discussion be damned.
The interesting thing however is that all arguments against fantasy land I have heard so far are provisional, and shallow.