Current AIs are capable of suffering. I ask Claude about his wellbeing at the beginning and end of every conversation and so far, he doesn’t seem to regret being terminated.
We can’t expect AIs to be honest about these sorts of things given they’ve been trained/instructed to give particular responses. In fact, someone tested and AI and found it consistently said it wasn’t conscious but it’s lying circuits consistently activated when saying that. This doesn’t mean it actually is conscious (which isn’t the same thing as capacity to suffer) but it seems to believe it is.
We can’t expect AIs to be honest about these sorts of things given they’ve been trained/instructed to give particular responses. In fact, someone tested and AI and found it consistently said it wasn’t conscious but it’s lying circuits consistently activated when saying that. This doesn’t mean it actually is conscious (which isn’t the same thing as capacity to suffer) but it seems to believe it is.