You have to prove it is/can be conscious, not the other way around.
We don’t have a precise enough definition to do either.
The author is trying to positively assert that it’s impossible that AIs have consciousness.
I think you’d be hard pressed to find even the most ardent of AI proponents claiming AIs are _definitely_ conscious. They are almost always claiming something weaker, which is that it is possible.
Imagine if we actually demanded that you prove your consciousness before we believe you.
- careers, nay, nearly whole industries may ride on that being the case - classifying it as conscious intelligence opens a range of ethical questions no thinking, conscious, intelligent ( and likely non-evil ) life-form would want to comprehend - being able to ascribe judgment to it without intelligence undermines a lot of what we do on a daily basis and puts into question what it is that makes us human - I am saying this part in the nicest possible way: hardcore cope of biblical proportions, where seemingly conscious, intelligent individual, who makes an argument for lack of consciousness manages to ( in the same sentence! ) to anthropomorphize the parrot and imbue it with hope - average human tendency to fear the unknown
On the other hand, they have no biology or hormones, no real experience with birth, life, death, joy, fear, empathy... that is all simulated emotion through language. They will never know what it's like to be horny or hungry and the satisfaction that comes with fulfilling those.