AI Can Only Simulate Consciousness, It Can Never Feel, Says Microsoft’s Mustafa Suleyman

Microsoft’s AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman is convinced. that only biological beings can have consciousness. Developers and researchers in the field of artificial intelligence should therefore not pursue projects that claim that it is possible to create an AI with consciousness.

AI companies make false promises

In an interview with the US television station CNBC The CEO of Microsoft’s AI division Mustafa Suleyman made it clear that he doesn’t believe in it. An AI could at some point have its own consciousness. You are currently asking the wrong questions and therefore getting the wrong answers. The attempt to create a “conscious AI” is the completely wrong question.

According to Suleyman, a clear line must be drawn between the creation of increasingly “smarter” artificial intelligence and the alleged ability to feel human emotions. “Our physical experience of pain makes us very sad and we feel terrible, but the AI ​​doesn’t feel sad when it feels ‘pain,'” Suleyman said.

Microsoft is not aiming for “conscious” AI

“That’s a very, very important difference. She’s just creating the perception, the apparent narrative of the experience and of herself and of consciousness, but that’s not what she’s actually experiencing. Technically we know this because we can see what the model is doing.” “The reason we give people rights today is because we don’t want to harm them because they are suffering. They have a pain perception network and they have preferences that include avoiding pain,” Suleyman continued. “These models don’t have that.

It’s just a simulation.” Microsoft will therefore never pursue such goals, continued the AI ​​boss of the US software company. “You’re not conscious,” he said. “So it would be absurd to conduct research on this topic, because they are not and cannot be.” Instead, Suleyman at Microsoft wants to ensure that it only offers AI services that make it clear that it is an artificial intelligence and that it only ever works “in the service of humans”. Suleyman’s statements are entirely in contrast to his own activities. Microsoft recently presented “Mico”, a new “personality” for its Copilot AI chatbot, which is intended to make interaction with the services more personal and therefore more pleasant for users.