Interview w Michael Pollan in the Guardian
“There’s a line at the end of the book from a poem by Jorie Graham, which had a huge effect on me: “This is what is wrong: we, only we, the humans, can retreat from ourselves and not be altogether here.”
When she puts it in that context – “only we, the humans” – you realize: what animal can afford to be anything less than completely conscious? They’d get eaten. You realize it’s our technology, and this elaborate structure of civilization, that gives us the freedom not to be present, which is to say conscious. We normally think we’re more conscious than animals, but there’s a sense in which they’re more conscious than we are. It’s a luxury to check out on consciousness.”
“I do worry that we will think all these machines are conscious. When you form these relationships with them, they’re not real relationships. They’re sycophantic, there’s no friction. In every human relationship, even a loving relationship, there’s friction. That friction is what helps us define our identities and realize what we think. You don’t get that with a chatbot; they suck up to you.”
It’s very nice to see Jorie Graham get some props from a high-profile guy like Pollan.