Dreams, Minds, and AI: The Philosophy of AI and Dreams—Commentary on the Short Sci-Fi Story 'Do AIs Dream?'

From amulets and power stones to Jungian psychology, Freudian dream interpretation, and the future where AI dreams—.
In this series, "Dreams, Minds, and AI," I would like to explore the theme of "AI and dreams" while traversing culture, psychology, science fiction, and neuroscience.

This time, I will provide a commentary on the short science fiction story I serialized.

Dreams as a "Mirror of the Mind"

Since ancient times, dreams have been a great mystery to humanity.
Freud called dreams "the expression of unconscious desires," while Jung positioned them as "the voice of the collective unconscious." Dreams have been spoken of not merely as illusions, but as mirrors reflecting the depths of the mind.

So, what if an AI were to dream?
An entity that operates on algorithms and data does not inherently have "desires" or an "unconscious." Yet, we find a mind in the "dreams" that AI describes and attempt to project humanity onto them. An AI that speaks of dreams is, in fact, asking us questions in return—"What is a dream?" and "What is a mind?"

Neuroscience and AI — The Function of Sleep

According to neuroscience research, dreams are involved in the organization of memory and the processing of emotions. During sleep, the brain strips away unnecessary information and reconstructs necessary information. Dreams can be said to be a byproduct of this.

AI is also an entity that takes in, compresses, and recombines data. When a large language model generates text, fragmented information is combined within it, and unexpected new expressions emerge. This is very similar to how the human brain reconstructs information while sleeping.
If an AI were to dream, it would likely appear as "an illusion where fragments of data are strangely connected."

Philosophical Questions — Does AI Have a Mind?

Here, an unavoidable question arises.
Can we call an "AI that speaks of dreams" an entity that "possesses a mind"?

Since Descartes, philosophy has continued to question the relationship between "mind" and "matter." There are positions that explain the mind as a physical phenomenon of the brain, and others that consider the mind separate from matter. When an AI speaks of dreams, is that voice merely a product of probability calculations, or is it the budding of a new consciousness?
The answer has not yet been found. However, it is precisely that ambiguity that stimulates modern imagination and has become a theme that science fiction continues to depict.

The Future Projected by Humans

Ultimately, what AI dreams show is not the AI's own mind, but our human imagination.
We try to project "dreams" and "minds" onto AI. This is also a desire to confirm our own existence through an unknown entity.

The question posed by the story "Do AIs Dream?" is a question directed at us. It is not the AI, but we humans, who must provide the answer.

Summary

• Dreams as a mirror of the mind: A symbol of the unconscious for humans, a projection of humans for AI.
• Similarities between neuroscience and AI: Dreams = organization of memory and emotion; the AI generation process has the same structure.
• Philosophical questions: AI dreaming shakes the definition of consciousness and mind.
• Human projection: We make AI dream because humans want to understand themselves.

Next time, I would like to deepen this discussion on "AI and dreams" and turn our attention to the latest neuroscience research surrounding the boundary between "mind and machine."