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We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

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Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#91

Post by Krasnol »

lalaland1125 wrote: post #5

I don't think we are ready for the risk of mass manipulation through AI relationships. Imagine if Elon decides tomorrow morning that he wants to encourage all of the users of his AI relationship app to support Trump?

> I don't think we are ready for the risk of mass manipulation through AI relationships.

We are not ready but we're ripe for them.

The advertisement industry has fingered our brains and raped our attention while eating up all the information they could get, now "AI" is harvesting our "open relationship with sharing information about ourself". The merger between the work the Ad Industry has done in preparation with the new data will collect will be catastrophically successful.

Meanwhile, we willingfully slept on digital literacy. The effects ripple already through many aspects of our societies. Causing havoc.

We're running toward an really "interesting" peak in Western Societies and I don't see how that might stop or even slow down.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#92

Post by al_borland »

mentos wrote: post #56

Maybe AI can help socialize the anti social so they can make progress towards real human interaction?

So much of human interaction is non-verbal, which a chatbot isn't going to help with. Using AI in this way is a form or procrastination.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#94

Post by strken »

cheschire wrote: post #84
somenameforme wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mine as well. Trolling pedos on AOL who thought they were meeting up with teen girls was our past time. We got quite good at looking up locations, organizing places to meet, and more. We were Chris Hansen, in bored teen boys form. Ah the days of A/S/L.

For the younger crowd, A/S/L? Was a typical introduction between people who were taking their chat to the next level. Like a handshake introduction in a room of crowded people where up to that point you were just throwing responses into the group discussion. This was in the days of IRC and Yahoo! Chat. Age/Sex/Location?

And 13/f/cali was the traditional facetious reply.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#95

Post by RamblingCTO »

But it's not gonna solve loneliness. Machines can't replace human contact. It can be a weak substitute like doom scrolling or media consumption is for feeling your own feelings, but it's not gonna replace human contact in all it's entirety and is a bad solution to an important problem. Are people who think and write this so alienated from their own race that they don't know what that all entails? The hormones, the connectedness, touch, smell, moments, joy, tears, everything. This will never be replaced by a machine or some code. Capitalism and our culture (which is driven by late stage capitalmism) destroyed community. It won't fix it. I'm afraid of people who feel/think like that to be honest.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#96

Post by cosmic_cheese »

AlecSchueler wrote: post #16
cedws wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s also doomscrolling. I genuinely think a large portion of Gen Z would rather stay in bed watching Instagram reels than go out to a bar or club. I’ve been wondering recently what impact banning social media would have on birth rates. I’m confident it would be positive but I’m not sure on what magnitude.

> I’ve been wondering recently what impact banning social media would have on birth rates. I’m confident it would be positive The obsession with their birth rates is one of the creepy reasons why young people don't want to go out.

It’s my perception that’s there’s been a negative reaction to pressure on younger people to have kids for a while now.

As a mid 30s millennial, it sure did feel weird back in my early 20s when older people from my rural hometown asked why I hadn’t found someone to marry and started a family yet. I had yet to even figure out who I was and how to be responsible, upstanding adult but somehow I’m supposed to take on a partner and N children too?! How does that make any sense? The chances of it ending in disaster of one sort or another are just too high, and that was obvious to me even in the midst of the naivety of a freshly minted adult.

Flash forward to today, and yes I’d like to do those things but I’m now in so much better of a position to do so that it’s difficult to even express. I’m glad I didn’t succumb to the pressure.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#97

Post by stdvit »

> Even in a world brimming with easy distractions—TikTok, Pornhub, Candy Crush, Sudoku—people still manage to meet for drinks, work out at the gym, go on dates, muddle through real life.

They actually don't. Everything from dating and fitness to manufacturing and politics is in decline in activities, and more so in effect and understanding. You can't convince (enough) people anymore that it is even important as many don't have capacity to do it. And it isn't even something new at this point.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#98

Post by RamblingCTO »

nathan_compton wrote: post #18

The idea that AI is going to "solve" loneliness is so insane. Even the framing of the idea is insane, in my opinion. Loneliness is not really about having someone to exchange words with, fundamentally. It is about being validated by other human beings or entities. At a most fundamental level the AI doesn't have a choice except to appear to validate you and this lack of freedom, the fact that you do not win over the A…

100%. There's always the layer of hormones, chemicals, touch, electric fields, and whatnot that also entails human contact. Mirror neurons. Stuff like that. It's like replacing a partner with a sex doll. I'm a bit sad that the author didn't have a take on the cheap reproduction of human contact and how it's connected to our broader culture and instead thinks about a non-solution to one of the issues that causes a lot of other bigger problems we're facing.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#99

Post by notarobot123 »

glimshe wrote: post #59

I believe that AI can't ever replace direct human contact. But I'm not so sure if a good AI can't replace superficial online-only friendships. Looking at the bulk of my online interactions (outside forums like this one), they largely end in trivia (did you know...) or low effort agreement. An AI could play that role admirably.

Isn't that more of a comment about the quality of weak-tie networks that exist on internet scale web platforms?

The rise of private group chats as the new lifeblood of social networking gives me hope that the state of the Web today isn't the end of the story. Authentic human connection across digital networks is still possible even if it isn't particularly common right now.

We need new protocols.

Re: We may not like what we become if A.I. solves loneliness

#100

Post by darepublic »

glimshe wrote: post #59

I believe that AI can't ever replace direct human contact. But I'm not so sure if a good AI can't replace superficial online-only friendships. Looking at the bulk of my online interactions (outside forums like this one), they largely end in trivia (did you know...) or low effort agreement. An AI could play that role admirably.

But having actual people react is a barometer for how much your thoughts align with others, or not. Or you may know you emotionally benefited someone, showed support etc. I take satisfaction from that but would absolutely not take satisfaction from some automated system replying +1 or what have you
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