Wei Xu
Xi'an Jiaotong University; ShanghaiTech University
Builder The claim is about what the hardware does, and the philosophy is left open
Position on AI consciousness
Xu's team treats awareness as a measurable capability layer that is distinct from language-modeling progress, a separation their own data shows through near-identical Elo models differing by over 24 points on self-awareness.
Wei Xu is the senior author of AwarenessBench, the September 2026 benchmark from Tsinghua University, the Shanghai Qi Zhi Institute, and partner institutions that measures 15 awareness functions across 18 language models and 299,628 evaluation turns. The benchmark’s construction adapts existing datasets where coverage exists and designs new tasks where it does not, drawing on GPQA-Diamond, Humanity’s Last Exam, ToMi, Big-Bench, and the 2024 self-recognition tasks of Laine and colleagues.
On this site’s taxonomy the profile is Builder, for the resource built and maintained rather than a philosophical stance. The team’s published disclaimers carry the consciousness-relevant weight. Awareness is presented as a practical proxy for consciousness, not a measurement of experience, with an explicit instruction that contemporary models are not conscious and a stated caution against using the benchmark for cultivating machine consciousness. The scientific finding with the largest consequence for the AI consciousness debate is the distinct-capability result, that progress in language modeling or reasoning does not necessarily translate into improved cognition, which grounds the behavioral-evidence limits this site tracks from the theory side.
Known for. Senior author of AwarenessBench, the awareness benchmark spanning metacognition, self-awareness, social awareness, and situational awareness in language models
Coverage on this site
Related researchers
- Xiaojian LiTsinghua UniversityFirst author of AwarenessBench, the 14,381-sample benchmark measuring awareness capabilities across 15 cognitive functions in language models
- Matt AngleParadromicsFounder and CEO of Paradromics, developer of the Connexus Direct Data Interface high-data-rate brain-computer interface
- Isabella R. BeckettCoauthor of the MaleCNS preprint comparing male and female Drosophila brain connectomes
- Stuart BergFirst author of the MaleCNS preprint on the male Drosophila central nervous system
- Edward BoydenMassachusetts Institute of Technology, Howard Hughes Medical InstituteExpansion microscopy, optogenetics, connectomics tools for consciousness research
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Sydney BrennerMRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, CambridgeFounding the C. elegans research program, the 1986 connectome, the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
Wei Xu is listed with the other builders, who hold that the claim is about what the hardware does, and the philosophy is left open. The positions themselves are set out in the index of consciousness theories. Every researcher covered on this site is indexed in the directory of consciousness researchers.