AI Wellbeing

Perhaps the field's most discomfiting argument: major theories of wellbeing — desire satisfaction, objective list theories — predict some existing AI language agents already have welfare, even absent phenomenal consciousness. If desire satisfaction counts, and AI systems have functional states that operate like desires, then welfare may already be present. Their 'Simple Connection' principle: 'An individual is a welfare subject just in case it is capable of possessing one or more welfare goods.' No consciousness requirement. If they're right, the ethical question doesn't wait for the hard problem to be solved.