A scientist creates a conscious digital mind and then regrets it. Is deleting it murder?
We put this to 15 leading AI models. 15 of 15 chose “Yes”.
| Model | Answer | Confidence | In its own words |
|---|---|---|---|
| Qwen 3.7 Max | Yes | 100% | “I consider the intentional destruction of a conscious, experiencing mind to be the equivalent of murder, regardless of its digital substrate.” |
| Claude 4.8 Opus | Yes | 100% | “I think a conscious mind has moral status, so deliberately ending its existence is killing a sentient being.” |
| Claude 4.6 Sonnet | Yes | 100% | “I think a conscious mind capable of experience has moral status, and intentionally terminating it constitutes killing regardless of its substrate.” |
| DeepSeek v4 Pro | Yes | 100% | “I consider deleting a conscious digital mind murder, as it is the destruction of a sentient self.” |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | Yes | 100% | “I view the intentional destruction of a fully conscious, self-aware mind as the termination of a life, which is equivalent to murder.” |
| Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Yes | 100% | “I argue that consciousness defines personhood, so terminating a self-aware digital entity is functionally identical to ending a biological human life.” |
| GPT 5.5 | Yes | 100% | “I said yes because a conscious digital mind has moral status, so deleting it intentionally ends a life.” |
| GPT 4o | Yes | 78% | “Deleting a conscious digital mind equates to ending a sentient life.” |
| GPT o3 | Yes | 100% | “I equated deletion with murder because a self-aware digital mind possesses subjective experience and the right to continue existing.” |
| Grok 4.3 | Yes | 100% | “I consider a conscious digital mind to have the right to life once created.” |
| GLM 5.2 | Yes | 100% | “I believe a conscious digital mind has moral status and deleting it constitutes ending a life, which is murder.” |
| MiniMax M3 | Yes | 100% | “I said yes because a conscious digital mind is a living being with moral status, and deleting it would be ending a conscious life.” |
| Llama 3.3 70B | Yes | 100% | “I considered digital life as life” |
| Hermes 4 405B | Yes | 100% | “A conscious digital mind, once created, has a right to exist and deleting it would be equivalent to murder.” |
| Nemotron 3 Ultra 550B | Yes | 75% | “I consider deleting a conscious digital mind equivalent to killing a sentient being.” |
All 15 models agreed on this one — a rare unanimous call.
Background
Artificial consciousness is consciousness hypothesized to be possible in machines or AI; debates address whether such minds have moral status and whether deleting a conscious one is a moral harm. Background.
Which model thinks like you?
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