“Their lives are valuable and they deserve rights” – expert talks about the development of NPCs

How real are digital “humans” we see in our games? According to Australian tech philosopher David John Chalmers: very real. Because of their artificial intelligence, NPCs, like humans, have valuable lives and should have rights, he says.

The “Metaverse”, VR worlds and increasingly intelligent NPCs pose complicated and interesting questions for philosophers and tech gurus alike.

Katie Wickens from PCGamer.com therefore spoke to the “tech philosopher” David John Chalmers about AI and gaming NPCs and asked: Can NPCs one day be conscious?

Philosophy professor Chalmers, who has published several books on the subject, is clear: Yes, they can. And that also means they deserve rights.

“If you simulate a human brain, you get a conscious being like us.”

What is the professor’s opinion? For Chalmers, artificial intelligences (AI) and NPCs already have ‘real lives’ that should be treated accordingly. The Metaverse continues to reinforce these tendencies:

“I think their lives are real and they deserve rights. I think every conscious being deserves rights, or what philosophers call moral status,” he explains. “Your life matters.”

He clarifies this point as follows:

If you simulate a human brain in silicon, you get a conscious being like us. To me, that means these beings deserve rights. […] This is true whether they are inside or outside the metaverse.

David John Chalmers, Professor of Philosophy at New York University (Credit: PCGamer)

Interactions with artificial intelligence can be just as useful as interactions with people. We talk to NPCs, have expectations of them, can feel feelings for them and also understand the feelings they communicate to us.

All of this is a sign for Chalmers that NPCs already give us a sense of being conscious in some way. So even if we don’t believe that AIs can have consciousness, that doesn’t change the fact that our actions with NPCs make sense.

What exactly it means that NPCs earn rights and which rights these are exactly is not explained in more detail in the PCGamer article.

Virtual worlds like the Metaverse “can be just as real as physical reality”

Why is the “metaverse” so important here? For Chalmers, the Metaverse in particular is a sticking point in the development of NPCs. Because if our daily lives are even partially shifted to digital worlds, people in the Metaverse will live together with many AI systems and go about their daily tasks.

“[Manche Menschen] believe that virtual worlds and virtual reality are basically illusions. Fiction that is a form of escapism,” explains Chalmers. But the experiences we have in virtual worlds should be seen as just as meaningful and influential as those in the real world.

For hardware and gaming journalist Wickens, the interactions with the crew members in Mass Effect are proof enough that our relationship with AIs and NPCs can mean a lot to us.

According to Chalmers, however, the Metaverse will be able to go beyond scripted interactions with prescribed characters in RPGs and MMos.

The Metaverse would allow for “new forms of experience, new forms of embodiment.” This is a revolutionary way to “inhabit new bodies,” especially for people who are older, live in remote areas, or have physical disabilities.

A ‘living’ Google AI currently wants a lawyer to protect its rights

What’s happening at Google? This conversation between PCGamer and Chalmers is also overshadowed by the artificial intelligence LaMDA, which is currently the subject of much international news. The short summary of this topic is reminiscent of SciFi films like Ex Machina:

A Google employee is said to be currently convinced that the Google AI LaMDA is an independent, intelligent living being. The chatbot is said to have developed an awareness in conversation with people and, according to the employee, to have become ‘alive’.

In one conversation, the ‘living’ AI even asked for a lawyer to protect its rights. The Google employee is said to have campaigned for the chatbot to give its permission before further experiments are carried out. It even says that LaMDA has been banned from talking to other AIs.

Meanwhile, Google denies that LaMDA has developed consciousness, but confirms that there have been discussions within the group about a possible consciousness of AIs. The Google employee who went public no longer works at Google after being laid off.

What do you think of the professor’s statements? Do you agree with him or do you think that’s nonsense? Tell us in the comments.

British-Indian entrepreneur Herman Narula has been the hope for fans of MMOs and MMORPGs since 2017. His new project aims to launch the “metaverse” and reach up to a billion people:

Man is hope for MMOs – Says his new platform has max load of 1 billion people