True, there is no language that makes it difficult to write horrible code.

Not even domain specific ones.

Home networks do need SNMP. How else would you know that your network printer is running low in ink?

A lot of home automation equipment also uses SNMP, although MQTT has become more popular in recent years.

The router not having ports of its own open on the internet side seems reasonable, but ISPs want to be able to remotely configure their modem routers at their customers.

The best way to hijack a router is from the internal side anyway. JavaScript in web ads can do wonders.

Nor should it need to. That's the concern of the web daemon.

Separation of concerns. Modularity. Keep it small and simple.

...?

My little explanation was nowhere near that thorough!

Of course Claude doesn't work just like human consciousness. That would be ridiculous.
And that's not the claim they are making either. Merely that they found something that resembles something that they think is part of human consciousness.

The point I was trying to make is not related to that. I only pointed out that science is not completely ignorant on the nature of consciousness. It is not supernatural, and meaningful comparisons are possible.

I don't know who "we" is.

There is a lot that is known and understood if you care to learn.

The fundamental thing about experiments is that they are repeatable. Neither subjective nor unfalsifiable.

What a coincidence, so do I:

"In physics, imagination is more important than mathematics."

(He later won a Nobel prize for proving quantum mechanics.)

I'm not sure what the point of this is, but anecdotes are not data.

Oh boy.

Let me teach you about the burden of proof. It was formulated by a guy named Bertrand Russel. He was a mathematician and a philosopher.

The burden of proof is something that is borne by someone making a claim.
What is asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.

The claim that consciousness, something that has only been observed and studied within the physical universe, could exist without a physical substrate wherein it occurs, is white an extraordinary claim, and is not supported by any evidence. As such, it can be dismissed without evidence.

On the other hand, there are numerous different experiments that show that consciousness does not occur without physical processes. Which is not extraordinary at all. (Cybernetics, for example, is about the study and design of systems that direct themselves.) So there is plenty of experimental evidence that suggests that consciousness not only occurs withing the physical universe (and it has never been observed outside of it), but could not exist without it.

It's science, not Science, and you can read up on the evidence. I provided a few pointers. Listing it all would take years.
(There are many experiments you can do at home.)

Somebody did dare to do it before. And did not face drastic legal implications.

True, but you may be interested to know that Google maintains a page cache (you could click on the link or click on Google's cached copy), and uses it for commercial purposes (they are one of the largest advertising agencies).

AI has no moat.

Except for the people actually studying that kind of thing, of course.

A very important work in that space is Gilbert Ryle's Theory Of Mind, 1950. It introduces the concept of "category error" to explain how people like Decartes confuse a metaphor for what it stands for. ("To the left is the forest, and to the right are the trees of the forest." That kind of thing.) It also lists ways in which the mind is not a continuous thing, and in particular how consciousness is only present occasionally. He thoroughly disproves the Cartesian body-mind dualism.

Also interesting is Daniel Dennett's Consciousness Explained, 1991. Despite the title, it is more of a tacit proposal than an explanation, but it draws from a vast corpus of psychological experiments about perception and inner monologue, and dispells common and persistent myths about the mind, consciousness, and perception; in particular what he calls the "Cartesian theater of the mind". Like Ryle, Dennett emphasizes how the mind is not a physical locus, but more of an ephemeral phenomenon, and not a central observer or actor either. He introduces "heterophenomenology" and the "many-drafts-model" to explain how perception and innner monologue can change from post-hoc stimuli without the conscious observer being conscious of this. He presents some fundmental criteria for consciousness. (Although he misunderstands computer programming.)

The question how consciousness can exist in the physical universe is misguided, at best. Without a physical universe, consciousness could not exist at all. This is something both Ryle and Dennet address as they dismantle Cartesian dualism. (The idea that consciousness exists independently of the body, as Descartes suggested, is a lie that is required only by religion: An afterlife or reincarnation requires that you are still alive when you are dead. Meanwhile, in reality, the illusion of continuity of consciousness is only an illusion, created by the conscious mind not being there to observe when it is not there.)

A lot of work has also happened in neuroscience, but I'm not up to date to the latest research.

Google did it since 1997.

The Outer Space Treaty declares outer space "international waters", which means that the orbital data centre is by no means extraterritorial, it has to be registered under a flag. Legally, per the OST, it's no different from having it in the middle of the ocean.

So that's not it, chief.

Obviously it is not cost, as you have pointed out.

Cost is not the objective, jurisdiction is not the objective, which leaves: Military applications.

And we have known that data mining impacts people's lives with rockets since the Snowden revelations.

Unless you know who did it already, you have no way of knowing if they are in China or Korea.

Machines are generally more secure today than 20 years ago.

Software firewalls were a big thing back then, and offered a convenient remote attack vector:
All ports open, just to report if someone pings your box. Running with administrator rights, of course.

Nowadays the common way is either to privilege escalate from JavaScript, or to go through Bluetooth.

Virulently infecting the anti-virus gives you a free rootkit, and nobody is surprised if that roots through their box.

The C&C aspect just helps mask any worms in the infection.