Consciousness and the Law

Consciousness isn't an idea, it's a legal barrier. Hear me out, consciousness in philosophy is usually postulated that there has to be something it's like to be you in order to be conscious. something to experience pain or pleasure, or other abstract various complex emotions like love that isn't just processing data.

There's a thought experiment that assigned every person in China to a few neurons, and postulated that China would be conscious if the people carried out all the same processes the neurons would in a brain.

I think in the modern day, this is so very relevant. We all know that our dogs are conscious. Sure they like getting food, but they for sure love you back more than a food drive. My dog Ace jumps up and can't stop kissing me after I come home from school after months of my mom feeding him (I think she stole my dog). But we don't consider dogs conscious because then they would have rights that people don't want to deal with.

Even throughout history, different races have even been called less then because it was convenient to give them less rights. "It's amazing what you can accomplish if you throw human suffering at it" is an encroaching sentiment to looking at historical accomplishments like the pyramids, transcontinental railroad, or many other things.

No, your llm in your phone isn't conscious. But there comes a point, if ai can replicate what we do, at what point do we say it's conscious, and deal with the legal consequences?

Source: https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a69809289/digital-brain-model/