Wiktoria Kozyra
United Kingdom
PhD Student
University of Oxford & University of Cambridge
Neuroscience/Cognitive Science
United Kingdom PhD Student University of Oxford & University of Cambridge Neuroscience/Cognitive Science
Project
Synthetic pleasure: Can a robot have an orgasm?
Project Overview
Most extant work on artificial intelligence has been focused on … intelligence, that is, on the cognitive aspects of information processing. Consciousness, however, crucially involves feelings: What it means for me to be a conscious agent is that *I* *feel* things; in other words, I have a representation of myself as an agent, and my experiences are valenced, that is, I have an affective disposition towards every internal or external state of affairs I am exposed to. Affect also plays a central role in motivation — which is what contemporary AI systems lack entirely. Hence the research question: What would it take to build an AI system that is capable of feeling things? How do we build AI systems that develop preferences? What could it possibly mean for an AI agent to experience pain or, perhaps even more taxingly, pleasure? Such questions can be approached from different perspectives, from evolutionary considerations and conceptual analysis to computational approaches.
Mentor
About the Scholar
I am a DPhil student at the University of Oxford, where I work with Prof. Matthew Rushworth and Dr Jan Grohn on cognitive computational neuroscience, focusing on how people infer generative models and latent causes. During my MSc in the same lab, I used fMRI to study distributional reinforcement learning in human reward processing. I am currently also completing an MPhil at the University of Cambridge with Dr Andrea Luppi and Prof. Emmanuel Stamatakis, working on macaque neural correlates of consciousness, particularly functional-connectivity changes during anaesthesia-induced loss of consciousness and deep-brain-stimulation-mediated recovery. Before this, I completed my BSc at UCL, where I worked with Prof. Steve Fleming on Bayesian models of metacognition in humans and convolutional neural networks, and with Prof. Patrick Haggard on EEG signatures of voluntary movement generation. I am originally from Poland, where I previously studied Mathematics and Economics at the University of Warsaw.
Why AISS?
"Consciousness is my main scientific and philosophical interest, and the motivation behind all my work. For my project with Axel, I am especially excited to think about what distinguishes systems that learn to behaviourally maximise rewards from those that have the capacity to experience pleasure. At a time when AI systems are becoming increasingly behaviourally human-like, I believe rigorous research on consciousness and sentience is more important than ever, especially because our intuitive judgements about consciousness attribution can be powerful but misleading. I am very grateful that this much-needed programme has been created, and honoured to be part of the AI Sentience Scholars cohort."
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