There are several commonly stated views regarding the plausibility and capability of AC, and the likelihood that AC will ever be real consciousness. Note that the terms Genuine and Not-genuine refer not to the capability of the artificial consciousness but to its reality (how close it is to real consciousness). Believers in Genuine AC think that AC can (one day) be real. Believers in Not-genuine AC think it never can be real. E.g. Some believers in Genuine AC say the thermostat is really conscious but they do not claim the thermostat is capable of an appreciation of music. In an interview Chalmers called his statement that thermostat is conscious "very speculative" and he is not a keen proponent of pan psychism (see page 298 of Chalmers (1996) whither panpsychism).

Objective less Genuine AC:

By "less Genuine" we mean not as real as "Genuine" but more real than "Not-genuine". It is alternative view to "Genuine AC", by that view AC is less genuine only because of the requirement that AC study must be as objective as the scientific method demands, but by Thomas Nagel consciousness includes subjective experience that cannot be objectively observed. It does not intend to restrict AC in any other way.

An AC system that appears conscious must be theoretically capable of achieving all known objectively observable abilities of consciousness possessed by a capable human, even if it does not need to have all of them at any particular moment. Therefore AC is objective and always remains artificial and is only as close to consciousness as we objectively understand about the subject. Because of the demand to be capable of achieving all these abilities, computers that appear conscious are a form of AC that may considered to be strong artificial intelligence, but this also depends on how strong AI is defined.

Not-genuine AC:

Artificial consciousness will never be real consciousness, but merely an approximation of it; it only mimics something that only humans (and some other sentient beings) can truly experience or manifest. Currently, this is the state of artificial intelligence and holders of the Not-genuine AC hypothesis believe that this will always be the case. No computer has been able to pass the somewhat vague Turing test, which would be a first step to an AI that contains a "personality"; this would perhaps be one path to a Genuine AC. By more strict view, subject of another field as AI should not be subject of AC, so by that only a study what(?) cannot be categorized anywhere else, such as artificial emotions, can be considered "Not-genuine AC".