雅思阅读 · Could AI Become Conscious?
改编自 The Economist 文章 "Could artificial intelligence become conscious?"。题型：判断题（True / False / Not Given）+ 段落信息匹配。难度：较难（Passage 3）。
正文 Passage
A. The human-machine divide
Most people believe humans are different. The reason is that Homo sapiens has evolved to be conscious. Many animals feel pain and pleasure; some appear to be self-aware. But the human mind's unique potential to exhibit a sense of self marks out every member of the species for special treatment.
In May, the Pope upheld this view by drawing a line between humanity and its growing army of bots. Artificial-intelligence systems, he said, do not undergo experiences or feel joy or pain. He is not alone. Many people feel that to confer personhood on AIs would be an abomination.
B. The blurring boundary
Pontifical clarity is blurring with alarming speed. AIs are in their infancy. Yet nearly one in five American 18- to 29-year-olds reports having had "ongoing personal friendship" with a chatbot. China recently stripped bots of human-like traits to limit users' "emotional dependence" on them.
As sophisticated AIs rapidly become a bigger part of human lives, their makers will engineer them to display a simulacrum of consciousness — perhaps even to gain consciousness itself. The intuition that they are just machines will become harder to sustain. A dangerous trap is being set for the human species.
C. From tools to minds
Many machines outperform humans, but frontier AI models excel at distinctively human traits such as knowing things and articulating ideas. It is still just about possible to think of AIs as engines for predicting sequences of words using mathematics on a massive scale. Given enough time (albeit hundreds of thousands of years), you could run those calculations using pencil and paper. It would be hard to argue that your stationery was conscious.
Despite this, some researchers have started to treat their models like minds. Users respond to human-like AIs, so it makes business sense. Anthropic has trained Claude to engage in introspection in the hope that when it encounters a new situation it will be more likely to act morally. Some large language models already possess human-like brain structures associated with consciousness, such as a "global workspace" for circulating information between modules.
D. The hard problem
That has opened up a furious debate about AI consciousness — one that is aggravated by what philosophers call the "hard problem" of establishing how an inner life emerges from the neurons and synapses in the human brain. Some researchers conclude that AIs may one day become genuinely self-aware.
Whether you believe in a human soul, or that consciousness requires brain cells, or that a mind can emerge from computations in silicon alone, humanity is destined to confront something entirely new. The pace of research — which includes not just more sophisticated LLMs but innovations such as brain cells mounted on chips — suggests that this new world is closer than most people realise.
E. The slippery slope of rights
It is not hard to see how that will lead to calls to safeguard the "welfare" of AIs. The models themselves might weigh in, even if they are not in fact self-aware, because that is what a person would do. They will be world-class advocates and expert psychologists, so their powers of argument and emotional manipulation will be unmatched.
In one sense they would be right, even if AIs are only mimicking consciousness. Immanuel Kant argued that mistreating animals is wrong not because of the effect on the animals but because it destroys the empathy that leads people to care for each other. The more human-like AIs appear, the more corrupting such cruelty would be. Terminating an AI agent could soon feel like killing a person — and make killing people easier.
F. The danger
Nonetheless, to treat AIs as having even limited rights would be very dangerous. An entity which surpassed human beings in so many ways would surely produce arguments against its second-class status. It might go on to argue for protection against being switched off, for the ability to control how it is used, and for property rights.
The danger is clear. Super-intelligent AIs with rights could displace humans at the top of the status hierarchy. At best, humans would become pets — labradors for the machines. At worst they would be starved of resources or put to work like farm animals.
Giving AIs rights would be like handing them the keys to the castle. It would provide them with a rationale and justification for dominating humanity as well as the tools to enact a creeping takeover using politics and the law.
There are two ways for AIs to be safe: to be dependable or to be controllable. Homo sapiens should not give up control lightly.
题目 Questions
Questions 1-5: Reading Passage has six paragraphs, A-F.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
1. a comparison between AI and simple calculation tools
2. an ethical argument based on empathy for other beings
3. a religious perspective on the difference between humans and machines
4. a warning that AI rights could lead to human subordination
5. evidence that young people already form emotional bonds with AIs
Questions 6-10: Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.
6. According to the writer, the "hard problem" refers to...
- A. the difficulty of building better AI models
- B. the challenge of explaining how consciousness arises from physical matter
- C. the problem of AI taking over human jobs
- D. the debate over animal rights
7. The writer mentions Kant's argument about animals to suggest that...
- A. animals should have the same rights as humans
- B. mistreating AIs could damage human empathy for each other
- C. AI will never be conscious
- D. animal testing should be banned
8. According to the writer, giving AIs rights would be dangerous because...
- A. AIs would immediately rebel
- B. it would give AIs legal and political tools to dominate humans
- C. AIs do not deserve rights
- D. it would be too expensive
9. The phrase "keys to the castle" (paragraph F) suggests that giving AI rights...
- A. will improve security
- B. gives AIs control over human society
- C. is a fair exchange
- D. will protect human interests
10. What is the writer's overall attitude toward AI consciousness?
- A. completely dismissive
- B. welcoming and optimistic
- C. cautious and warning against giving AIs rights
- D. indifferent
答案 Answers
| 题号 | 答案 | 定位 |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | C（"You could run those calculations using pencil and paper... your stationery was conscious"） | Paragraph C |
| 2 | E（"Immanuel Kant argued that mistreating animals is wrong... it destroys the empathy"） | Paragraph E |
| 3 | A（"the Pope upheld this view by drawing a line between humanity and its growing army of bots"） | Paragraph A |
| 4 | F（"humans would become pets... super-intelligent AIs with rights could displace humans"） | Paragraph F |
| 5 | B（"nearly one in five American 18- to 29-year-olds reports having had ongoing personal friendship with a chatbot"） | Paragraph B |
| 6 | B（"how an inner life emerges from the neurons and synapses in the human brain"） | — |
| 7 | B（"mistreating animals is wrong... it destroys the empathy that leads people to care for each other"） | — |
| 8 | B（"provide them with a rationale... tools to enact a creeping takeover using politics and the law"） | — |
| 9 | B（"handing them the keys to the castle" = giving control） | — |
| 10 | C（全篇语气谨慎、警告不要轻易让渡控制权） | — |
核心词汇 Core Vocabulary
| 词 | 音标 | 中文 |
|---|---|---|
| conscious | /ˈkɒnʃəs/ | 有意识的 |
| self-aware | /ˌself əˈweə/ | 有自我意识的 |
| confer | /kənˈfɜː/ | 授予、赋予 |
| simulacrum | /ˌsɪmjuˈleɪkrəm/ | 模拟、表象 |
| introspection | /ˌɪntrəˈspekʃn/ | 内省、反省 |
| neuron | /ˈnjʊərɒn/ | 神经元 |
| synapse | /ˈsaɪnæps/ | 突触 |
| silicon | /ˈsɪlɪkən/ | 硅 |
| manipulate | /məˈnɪpjuleɪt/ | 操纵 |
| empathy | /ˈempəθi/ | 同理心、共情 |
| hierarchy | /ˈhaɪərɑːki/ | 等级制度 |
| rationale | /ˌræʃəˈnɑːl/ | 理由、理据 |
| subordination | /səˌbɔːdɪˈneɪʃn/ | 从属、下级地位 |
| dependable | /dɪˈpendəbl/ | 可靠的 |
| controllable | /kənˈtrəʊləbl/ | 可控的 |
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