Giuseppe,

An interesting effort to peel away some of the issues with AI. Though as an effort to reverse engineer human experience through the lens of information technology, there might be some preconceptions worth examining;

For instance, it is helpful to keep in mind the “hard problem” of consciousness can be quantified as one of essence, rather than ideal. Given the roots of western culture are monotheistic, there is an inherent tendency to confuse the absolute with the ideal. For instance, a “spiritual” absolute, as the source of consciousness, contrary to monotheism, would be the essence of sentience, from which we rise, not an ideal of wisdom and judgement, from which we fell. More the new born, than the wise old man. Consciousness seeking knowledge, than any particular form of it. The light shining through the film, than the images on it.

Given that good and bad are not a cosmic dual between the forces of righteousness and evil, but the basic biological binary of beneficial and detrimental, social codes of conduct evolve upwards, there becomes a use for the father figure lawgiver as a narrative device for teaching future generations accepted behavior. While many have come to doubt the literal reality of this figure, the society still remains under the impression of the ideal as absolute.

Which does go to the notion of Artificial Intelligence; That the processing of information/knowledge/wisdom somehow gives rise to consciousness, rather than information processing being a particular talent of conscious beings.

To distinguish between consciousness and thought, consider time;

As mobile, intentional organisms we have a sequential perception process, as a necessary function for navigating our environment. We then build civilizations out of the collective knowledge gained by narrating our journeys.

So we perceive time as the point of the present, moving past to future. Much as we still see the sun rising in the east and setting in the west. The reality though, is that it is change turning future to past, much as it is the earth spinning west to east. Tomorrow becomes yesterday, because the earth turns.

So there is only this physical state and time is emergent from its dynamics, like temperature, pressure, color, etc. We could use ideal gas laws to correlate volume with temperature and pressure, but no one calls them the 5th and 6th dimensions of space, as they are only foundational to our emotions, bodily functions and environment, not the sequencing of thought.

As this physical dynamic goes from one configuration the next, this conserved property of energy goes past to future, while the forms generated go future to past.

Energy is conserved, because there is no physical past for it to recede into, or physical future for it to arrive from. The past is effectively consumed by the present, in order to inform it, aka causality. Potential, actual, residual.

This is the relationship between process and pattern, as process churns along, while patterns rise and fall, like so many waves.

Consider a factory, where the product goes start to finish, while the production line goes the other way, consuming material and expelling product. Individual lives go birth to death, while the process of life goes onto the next generation, shedding the old.

As with consciousness and thought; With consciousness, as process, going from one thought to the next, while thoughts come and go, in opposite directions of time. Each thought being consumed by the next, in order to inform it. Layering our minds with form and information.

In the larger dynamic, it is the side effects that are equally important. Much as the salaries and profits generated drive the production of products. The thermodynamic feedback loops are endless. Time is a tapestry being woven of threads pulled from it. The end is punctuation, not destination.

Galaxies amount to a cosmic convection cycle, of energy radiating out, as mass precipitates in.

So trying to understand why artificial intelligence is modern alchemy requires peeling back some of the assumptions built deeply into our culture.

Our tools, mental and physical, are extensions of us, but when we project ourselves too much into them, they become our gods.