The Unbearable Lightness of Being With Robots
When we have feelings about a machine, are we for real?
As AI and robots expand into day-to-day life, they ought to adhere to the ancient principle of medicine: First, do no harm. Whatever a new technology does for humans, we would like it not to make life worse. 1
Yet many of us worry, given the effects of the last few digital revolutions, which many people, both lay and scholarly, believe contributed to depression, anxiety and a loss of social connection. Now, we’re at the dawn of social machines – AI therapists, AI “friends,” robot companions and robot co-workers, It’s the right time to find out if these innovations could take society in a direction we don’t want to go. Because if we need to course correct, it’s best done before we use AI for everything and have robots in every household.
In this post I want to suggest that we may have a problem already, that needs more attention.
Let’s call it the Pretender Problem: Conversational AI and emotionally-savvy r…