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Comment by Geoffrey Hinton

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Godfather of Deep Learning
Suppose I say to a chatbot, I saw the Grand Canyon flying to Chicago. And the chatbot says, that can't be right. The Grand Canyon is much too big to fly to Chicago. And I say, no, no, no, it was me flying to Chicago. While I was flying to Chicago, I saw the Grand Canyon. And the chatbot says, oh, I see, I misunderstood you. So if it misunderstood when it thought the Grand Canyon was flying to Chicago, what's it doing when it gets it right? It's understanding. [...] We have to think that they're very like us. They're beings like us. [...] I believe they're already conscious, yes.
AI Verified source (Jun 3, 2026)
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Policy proposals and claims
AI might become conscious
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Statement relation comments

AI Verified ai_verified because the quote explicitly addresses AI consciousness: the author says chatbots are "beings like us" and "I believe they're already conscious, yes." If the author believes AI is already conscious, that clearly supports the broader statement that AI might become conscious. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 1h ago
AI Verified The quote clearly addresses AI consciousness directly: the author says chatbots are 'understanding' and explicitly states, 'I believe they're already conscious, yes.' That is a stronger form of support for the statement that AI might become conscious. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
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Vote answer comments

AI Verified The quote is stronger than the statement: the author says chatbots are "beings like us" and explicitly, "I believe they're already conscious, yes," which strongly implies support for "AI might become conscious." · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 1h ago
AI Verified For: the author explicitly says of chatbots/AI, "I believe they're already conscious, yes." If AI is already conscious, that strongly implies support for the weaker statement that AI might become conscious. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
AIs understand
votes For
Statement relation verification history AI Verified

Statement relation comments

AI Verified The quote directly addresses whether a chatbot understands: the author says that when it corrects a misunderstanding, 'It's understanding.' This clearly supports the full statement that AIs understand. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 1h ago
AI Verified The quote directly supports the statement. The author describes a chatbot correcting a linguistic ambiguity and explicitly concludes, 'when it gets it right? It's understanding,' which clearly indicates the author believes AIs can understand what we say. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
Vote inference verification history AI Verified

Vote answer comments

AI Verified The quote directly argues that a chatbot both "misunderstood" and, when corrected, "gets it right" because "It's understanding." That explicitly supports the claim that AIs understand. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 1h ago
AI Verified The quote strongly supports the statement: the author says that if the chatbot 'misunderstood' at first, then when 'it gets it right' "it's understanding." That directly implies AIs understand what we say. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago

Quote authenticity verification history

Quote authenticity comments

AI Verified The source URL’s transcript page for the Big Technology Podcast episode dated June 3, 2026 contains this passage at 00:10:46–00:11:41, including “Suppose I say to a chatbot, I saw the Grand Canyon flying to Chicago … It’s understanding,” then “We have to think that they’re very like us … They’re beings like us … I believe they’re already conscious, yes.” The omitted parts are consistent with the user’s [...] cuts, and the episode metadata identifies the guest/speaker as Geoffrey Hinton; Apple Podcasts also lists the same episode with Geoffrey Hinton published June 3, 2026. ([podscripts.co](https://podscripts.co/podcasts/big-technology-podcast/ai-pioneer-geoffrey-hinton-ai-is-conscious-superintelligence-is-coming-and-we-should-be-worried)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 1h ago
AI Verified The provided Podscripts transcript contains this passage verbatim, with the ellipsis simply bridging intervening dialogue/questions: at 00:10:46–00:11:41 Geoffrey Hinton gives the “Grand Canyon flying to Chicago” example, says “It’s understanding,” and later says “I believe they’re already conscious, yes.” The same episode is listed as “AI Pioneer Geoffrey Hinton: AI Is Conscious, Superintelligence is Coming, And We Should Be Worried” on June 3, 2026, so the stored author, date, and source URL are consistent. ([podscripts.co](https://podscripts.co/podcasts/big-technology-podcast/ai-pioneer-geoffrey-hinton-ai-is-conscious-superintelligence-is-coming-and-we-should-be-worried)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
Disputed The source page does contain this passage, and the episode date is June 3, 2026. But it is not a single Geoffrey Hinton quote: after Hinton’s Grand Canyon example, the lines “So then what are the implications...” and “If we believe that they can understand us...” are spoken by the interviewer, not Hinton. Apple’s episode page lists Alex Kantrowitz as the host and Geoffrey Hinton as the guest. Because the stored content merges multiple speakers and attributes them all to Hinton, this is misattributed as a single-author quote. ([podscripts.co](https://podscripts.co/podcasts/big-technology-podcast/ai-pioneer-geoffrey-hinton-ai-is-conscious-superintelligence-is-coming-and-we-should-be-worried)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
Disputed Authentic quote, but the stored metadata is not fully right. The PODScripts transcript for Big Technology Podcast’s episode “AI Pioneer Geoffrey Hinton: AI Is Conscious, Superintelligence is Coming, And We Should Be Worried” contains the Grand Canyon passage and “I believe they’re already conscious, yes,” attributed to Geoffrey Hinton, and it lists the episode date as June 3, 2026. Apple’s official episode page also lists publication on June 3, 2026. The author attribution is correct, but the stored date and source URL should be corrected to a verifiable source that actually contains the quoted text. ([podscripts.co](https://podscripts.co/podcasts/big-technology-podcast/ai-pioneer-geoffrey-hinton-ai-is-conscious-superintelligence-is-coming-and-we-should-be-worried)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
Disputed The provided Podscripts page does contain this wording in the transcript for the Big Technology Podcast episode dated June 3, 2026, including Hinton’s example about the Grand Canyon and the closing line, “I believe they’re already conscious, yes.” However, the stored quote is not a single-author quote by Geoffrey Hinton: it also includes interviewer Alex Kantrowitz’s questions such as “So then what are the implications...” and “If we believe that they can understand us...” Apple Podcasts lists Alex Kantrowitz as the host of this episode. So the text is real and the source/date appear right, but the attribution as one Geoffrey Hinton quote is not verifiable as a single-author quote. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
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