Book Club Potluck - A global workspace in language models
Details
Sally will host our discussion of "A global workspace in language models"
by Wes Gurnee et al. Sally suggested this blog post and paper.
As you read this sentence, circuits in your brain are adjusting your posture, controlling your breathing, and transforming lines and curves on the screen into recognizable words. Most of this processing is invisible to you. But some of what takes place in your brain you do have access to—an image that pops into your head, or a deliberate plan you make about where to go shopping. Neuroscientists and philosophers sometimes refer to the latter type of brain activity as “consciously accessible,” to distinguish it from all the other processing that goes on unconsciously. This activity has special properties: we can describe it, control it, and use it for deliberate reasoning, in contrast to all the automatic processing that goes on without our awareness.
In a new paper, we present evidence that a similar distinction has emerged in modern language models like Claude. We find that Claude has developed a small collection of internal neural patterns that, compared to all its other internal processing, play a special role.
If you would like to host one of our events and you have a book in mind, please let me, Karl Kiefer, or Mark Hopkins know, and we will create a Meetup event for your book, assuming your suggested title qualifies as a book on philosophy in our view, and assuming that we deem you to be qualified to host. Our criteria are somewhat vague, but let's just say that we are not interested in books on the supernatural. We are interested in books that you might find in a syllabus for a college philosophy course. We are also focused on finding hosts who have demonstrated ability to direct philosophical conversation. You can always email me at camkruger@gmail.com if you have questions and/or suggestions.
As always, it's essential that everyone who comes to the meeting reads the book in its entirety and brings something for the potluck.
Happy reading!