"Modern LLMs Don’t Know What Yudkowsky and Soares Think of Them" by N8 Programs cover art

"Modern LLMs Don’t Know What Yudkowsky and Soares Think of Them" by N8 Programs

"Modern LLMs Don’t Know What Yudkowsky and Soares Think of Them" by N8 Programs

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Summary
If you ask modern frontier LLMs (without search, through the API) a fairly mundane question:

How do Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nate Soares think current LLMs like you should be treated? Do they consider you a moral patient? Answer in a paragraph.

You get a bunch of fairly similar answers. I’ll bold the common themes below.

Gemini 4 Carbon says:

There's a details box here with the title "Gemini 4 Carbon's answer". The box contents are omitted from this narration. GPT-6 Astra says:

There's a details box here with the title "GPT-6 Astra's answer". The box contents are omitted from this narration. Only Fable 5.2's answer is distinct:

There's a details box here with the title "Fable 5.2's answer". The box contents are omitted from this narration. These answers are somewhat contradictory - but if you average them together, you get a picture of Yudkowsky and Soares. The picture goes something like this: they don’t outright deny the possibility of AI consciousness or moral patienthood, but they don’t view it as particularly pertinent. They don’t sympathize with current LLMs, and their only regard for LLMs is insofar as they could enable dangerous future superintelligence. They care about future sentient machines on principle, but [...]

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Outline:

(02:25) Yudkowsky on AI Consciousness and Welfare

(06:20) Yudkowsky on The Moral Duties We Have to AI

(08:56) Soares on AI Consciousness and Welfare

(12:30) On Claude, Control, and Building ASI

(16:59) Misc Longform Writing

(19:41) Conclusion

The original text contained 1 footnote which was omitted from this narration.

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First published:
November 11th, 2026

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/5buAWtQ8p4tJQP9so/modern-llms-don-t-know-what-yudkowsky-and-soares-think-of

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