Aeroplanes also fly: Analytic functionalism and the possibility of machine consciousness
Behavioral and Brain Sciences 2026 DOI: 10.1017/s0140525x25103919 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Commentary Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Key points | Agrees with Seth that human consciousness depends on life's distinctive biological machinery, undercutting the expectation that humanlike consciousness will come for free with more intelligent machines, but argues for caution in extrapolating from features of biological consciousness to the possibility of exotic artificial consciousness. |
Abstract
Abstract Seth mounts a rich and persuasive case that human consciousness cannot be understood without life’s distinctive machinery – autopoiesis, allostatic control, predictive processing under the free-energy principle, and substrate-entangled dynamics. I agree that this undercuts the expectation that humanlike consciousness will “come for free” with more intelligent machines. However, we should also be cautious about drawing extrapolations from features of biological consciousness – even essential features – to the possibility of exotic forms of consciousness in artificial systems.