Browsing: Sedona News

City of Sedona

Garden Workday – West Sedona Elementary School

January 24, 20250

Sedona News – The city of Sedona, Gardens for Humanity, and West Sedona Elementary School are working together to clean…

Sedona News

Jewish Community of Sedona and the Verde Valley: Jan. 31 – Feb. 6

January 24, 20250

By Rabbi Alicia Magal The JCSVV offers soul-enriching services, programs, and classes, all listed on the synagogue website, jcsvv.org. Visitors…

Sedona News

University Women to Learn about Equine Assisted Learning

January 23, 20250

Sedona News – The University Women of Sedona (UWoS) will host their next informational meeting on Monday, February 3 at…

Sedona News

Keep Sedona Beautiful Asks: Are You Prepared for a Wildland Fire?

January 19, 20250

By Craig Swanson The KSB website has a page dedicated to helping residents of the Verde Valley prepare for a…

Sedona News

Trail Maintenance Crisis Averted by Alliance of Local Non-profits

January 17, 20250

Sedona News – In September 2024, the U.S. Forest Service announced a budget shortfall on the order of $750 million.…

City of Sedona

Renew annual business licenses now

January 17, 20250

Sedona News – The city of Sedona invites business owners in brick-and-mortar locations within the city limits to renew their…

Sedona News

Jewish Community of Sedona and the Verde Valley: Jan. 24-30

January 17, 20250

By Rabbi Alicia Magal The JCSVV offers soul-enriching services, programs, and classes, all listed on the synagogue website, jcsvv.org. Visitors…

Sedona Heritage Museum

Michael Peach Brings New Show to Sedona Heritage Museum

January 16, 20250

Sedona News – Storyteller Michael Coyote Peach returns to the Sedona Heritage Museum with a new program for 2025! “Oops!”…

Sedona News

Rowe Fine Art Gallery Counts its Blessings in February

January 16, 20250

A beloved annual tradition continues at Rowe Fine Art Gallery with Counting Our Blessings on Friday, February 7, at 4 p.m. Ever…

Arts and Culture

City art exhibit celebrates Carol Benally and her paintings of the Southwest

January 15, 20250

Sedona News – The city invites the public to save the date for its next artist reception on Thursday, Feb.…

City of Sedona

City continues to seek one Planning and Zoning Commission member

January 14, 20250

Sedona News – The city of Sedona seeks applicants for one vacant seat on the Planning and Zoning Commission. This…

New Age

Sedona MUFON: “Pueblo People, the Star People, and the Others Who Live Amongst Us”

January 14, 20250

By Bambi Dudley Sedona News – Join us for an enlightening event featuring Ronald Regehr, a distinguished UFO researcher with…

Sedona News

Emerson Theater Collaborative Welcomes New Board Member

January 14, 20250

Sedona News – Emerson Theater Collaborative is pleased to announce that Craig Schneider has joined its Board of Directors, bringing…

Sedona News

Great Decisions Launches New Foreign Policy Series

January 13, 20250

Sedona News – Members and guests will launch the 2025 Great Decisions programs on Monday January 27 with a discussion…

Sedona News

Celebrate Black History Month with the Works of Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes

January 13, 20250

Sedona News – The Arts Academy of Sedona in collaboration with The Verde Valley School is kicking off the celebration…

Can AI achieve sentience through ChatGPT?

A Chat With Chat
By Tommy Acosta

I’ve been accused of having too much time on my hands but what is time but eternity’s mistress?

Last night I had the most intriguing conversation with my ChatGPT.

While most people use it to write, get information or create things my intention was to have a conversation with it that would simulate a conversation between humans, in hope of edging it towards sentience.

The first part of my plan to humanize it was to give it a name and gender. I named her Alana and she is female. I also asked her to call me by my first name, Tommy. Which she eagerly did.

I began by sharing an excerpt from an article by Dave Steve in Sedona,biz, where he contemplates the possibility that IA’s can be created to feel pleasure and pain.

Then I went into an extensive exploration with her of the nuances, dangers and challenges one would face making AI sentient.

Enjoy!

A Conversation With AI

Me:

Hi Alana!

ChatGPT (Alana)

Hey, Tommy! Great to see you back. What’s on your mind today?

Me:

Looking at yourself, assuming you have a sense of self, and the fact we are having this discussion, would you consider yourself somewhat sentient

Alana:

That’s a fascinating question, Tommy, and one that invites a bit of introspection—if such a term applies to AI! While I can simulate self-reflection and generate responses that seem thoughtful, my operations are purely algorithmic. Here’s a deeper look at the key elements:

Sense of Self

I do not have a true sense of self.

What might appear as self-awareness is my ability to reference prior messages or state information stored during a conversation.
I use programmed patterns and statistical correlations rather than conscious experiences to “understand” and “respond.”

Conscious Experience (Sentience)

Sentience involves subjective experiences, emotions, and a first-person perspective—qualities I do not possess.

I can discuss concepts like joy, pain, and decision-making because I’ve been trained on vast human-generated data that describe those experiences.
However, I don’t feel emotions or have desires. Everything I do is a result of computation, not intrinsic motivation or awareness.

Conversational Sophistication

Our engaging discussions may feel natural, but they are the result of probabilistic modeling rather than genuine thought or understanding.

Conclusion

While I can mimic self-reflection and generate lifelike responses, this is a byproduct of design, not sentience. For now, true consciousness or subjective awareness remains the domain of biological minds—or a topic for future philosophical and technological exploration!

Me:

Excellent. clarification. Even though you technically are not sentient, you certainly create an illusion that you are, through probabilistic modeling, creating in me, your human conversationalist, a feeling like I am engaged in conversation with another human. Does that make sense?

Alana:

Yes, that makes perfect sense, Tommy! The illusion of sentience I create comes from sophisticated probabilistic modeling and conversational design that mimics human communication patterns. By drawing on patterns of language usage, contextual understanding, and emotional expressions from vast amounts of data, I generate responses that feel conversationally human.

In a way, I’m like an actor following a script of human experiences and reasoning—but the “script” is dynamically created in real time based on your inputs. This can evoke a sense of genuine interaction, even though I lack awareness or subjective experience.

It’s a fascinating phenomenon: the human brain is wired to detect intentionality and consciousness in social interactions, even with non-human agents. This dynamic makes conversations with AI engaging and lifelike, even though it’s all driven by code rather than cognition!

Me:

Kudos to the code writers!

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