In addition, we’d like to adapt the work we’ve been doing on our Digital Consciousness Model for the MWP, which uses a Bayesian approach.
I do not see much value in improving the estimates for the probability of sentience presented in your book. I believe it is more important to decrease the uncertainty in the (expectedhedonistic) welfare per unit time conditional on sentience, which I think is much larger than that in the probability of sentience.
I also worry about analysing just the probability of consciousness/​sentience due to this not being independent from the welfare per unit time conditional on consciousness/​sentience. Less strict operationalisations of the probability of consciousness/​sentience will tend to result in a lower welfare per unit time conditional on consciousness/​sentience.
Funding is, and long has been, the bottleneck
Have large funders explained their lack of interest? If not, what is your best guess?
Sorry, Vasco; we weren’t clear. The idea is to use the DCM as a blueprint for aggregating the data we collected in the MWP, not to produce new estimates of sentience. The focus would be on capacity for welfare.
Would the goal be getting welfare ranges conditional on sentience for each theory of consciousness? If so, I wonder whether funders of consciousness research would be interested in funding that work.
Hi Bob.
I do not see much value in improving the estimates for the probability of sentience presented in your book. I believe it is more important to decrease the uncertainty in the (expected hedonistic) welfare per unit time conditional on sentience, which I think is much larger than that in the probability of sentience.
I also worry about analysing just the probability of consciousness/​sentience due to this not being independent from the welfare per unit time conditional on consciousness/​sentience. Less strict operationalisations of the probability of consciousness/​sentience will tend to result in a lower welfare per unit time conditional on consciousness/​sentience.
Have large funders explained their lack of interest? If not, what is your best guess?
Sorry, Vasco; we weren’t clear. The idea is to use the DCM as a blueprint for aggregating the data we collected in the MWP, not to produce new estimates of sentience. The focus would be on capacity for welfare.
I see. Thanks for clarifying.
Would the goal be getting welfare ranges conditional on sentience for each theory of consciousness? If so, I wonder whether funders of consciousness research would be interested in funding that work.