Alex Kantrowitz
Independent journalist covering the technology industry and its effect on society, with a focus on large tech companies and artificial intelligence.
“I just think we have to stop putting this in entirely human or entirely robot terms. Like, it's not conscious like a human. It's not dead like a rock, right? And it's not a life form. It's just some different thing.”
Big Technology · Tech Strategy & Big Tech · October 2026
Big Technology was discussing Anthropic's new rule against persistently abusing Claude, and whether the model could be conscious. Kantrowitz's view was that if you frame it as "conscious like a human," the conversation has already gone wrong.
Transcript
That would be, I think we would retain some of the audience. So that would be a good cliffhanger, but Info, Don’t believe you.
Info, Don’t know that. Info, Don’t know. I just think, can I just say
one sentence on this? I just think we have to stop putting this in entirely human or entirely robot terms. Like, it's not conscious like a human. It's not dead like a rock, right? It's just, and it's not a life form. It's just some different thing, right? Info, Don’t know. That's just my perspective. So if you try to say this is conscious like a human, the whole conversation is already blown in my perspective.
I actually, do you know what Info, Don’t strongly believe? And the only thing with any certainty, because otherwise, consciousness or questions of God and religion, Info, Don’t not know. I think there's just a lot of drugs. I think there's a lot of psychedelics. I mean, I'm going to be honest, like…
right. All right, Ronjan, bring us home. We got a minute. Tell us about Gemini, the new Gemini.
Same as the Gemini. Okay, okay. We'll make this one quick because I know we've got to get going. But Google had a massive announcement this week as a Thomas Curry and CEO of Google Cloud. Today at Google's Cloud Gemini work event, we announced Gemini. They launched Gemini. I loved this because it…
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