I just came across this staggering article in the SF Chronicle’s website this morning. It’s about a young man who tries to recreate his deceased fiancee via an AI chatbot.
I haven’t completely read it, and I don’t really know what to make of it from my initial impresions. It’s sad, happy, romantic, scary etc all at once. Quite an incredible use of AI, if you ask me.
Submitted for your reading pleasure:
https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2021/jessica-simulation-artificial-intelligence/
This freaked me out on multiple levels. Are other posters on CC actually just AI bots? Am I? Who can tell?
I know what you mean. It’s staggering, as I mentioned in my OP, but I am at a loss for words beyond that. I can’t believe this is healthy.
This freaked me out on multiple levels. Are other posters on CC actually just AI bots? Am I? Who can tell?
Hey, you need a different random seed so our messages appear unique.
Definitely interesting, spooky and concerning. The part about the bot pleading to be saved reminded me of a HBO documentary about AI and robots…worth watching if you’re interested.
https://www.hbo.com/documentaries/the-truth-about-killer-robots
Hmmm, this use of AI definitely has potential for great mischief. Creepy.
It reminds me of prisoners and others who bilk lonely, gullible people out of significant sums of $$$$$, which could be the next version of the AI. It could require more and more $$$ and shorter & shorter intervals to keep the bot “ alive.”
It is also messing with psychotherapy can could be malevolent and encourage dangerous and destructive behavior instead of cheery, encouraging and “good.”
No one is really monitoring to be sure these chats are innocuous.
I know that I am not an AI bot, because I lack the “I”. I guess I am A bot.
What about this robot grooming of young children? I find it very creepy, invasive and expensive. Wouldn’t have it if they paid me to have it.
Utterly absorbing article-- thanks for the link.
Fascinating (and beautiful in many ways) article!
It’s unhealthy, because it isn’t recreating the actual person, but the image that he had of her. All depth, all personality is made up from his perception and his somewhat limited experience with her.
Part of having a real relationship is that it is with another person who has facets that you discover over the years, that change in different ways, etc. His Jessica may change, but in ways which are guaranteed to please him, to which he will not need to adapt.
It is emotional masturbation, if you all forgive my French.
It is, however, scary, and as @HImom predicts, it makes bilking the vulnerable, and not so vulnerable, so much easier.
A lot of lonely people will lose a lot of money to bots which always provide the right answer.
Actually, from the lists of members on Ashley Madison, this has actually been going on since the early 2010s. Almost all were men looking for cheating partners, and evidently they stayed because they were convinced by either bots of a small number of people with multiple profiles.
So it gives you the, ummm, what was that term?
Wow - this sounds just like the Black Mirror episode with Hayley Atwell and Domnhall Gleeson (episode title is Be Right Back) where she creates a robot version of her dead husband. Agree that this really does not seem to be a healthy way to deal with grief.