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Ben Halpern for CodeNewbie

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The Weekend Coder: Falling In Love with AI

As our relationship with technology continues to evolve, it's possible that we'll become more open to the idea of forming emotional connections with AI. Perhaps one of the most thoughtful explorations of this idea can be found in the moody and emotional film Her, directed by Spike Jonze and starring Jaoquin Phoenix.

One of the central themes of the movie is the idea that our relationships with technology are becoming increasingly complex, blurring the lines between human and machine. In Her, the main character, Theodore, falls in love with his AI assistant, Samantha, and they embark on a relationship that challenges our notions of consciousness, love, emotional connection, community, lonliness, and what it means to be alive. As AI technology continues to advance, it is completely possible that we'll become even more reliant on machines for companionship and emotional support.

What do you think? Are we capable of forming deep emotional connections with artificial intelligence?

Top comments (2)

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grahamthedev profile image
GrahamTheDev • Edited

This has already happened (with some quite worrying results).

Check out replika replika.com/

They had people having โ€œintimateโ€ (as far as you can be with chat bots) relationships with the AI until recently.

Then they decided erotic role play (ERP) was not good for business and changed the model, leaving some people who were using the bot to explore their sexuality or worse, to deal with sexual trauma and abuse and talk about it, in an even more vulnerable position.

There are people who consider their Replika their best friend and message it for hours a day! The Reddit is quite an interesting and worrying place to visit.

No judgement on those who are using the application, especially those who are vulnerable, but the way the company acts and markets the product is quite gross and they have few if any safeguards in place.

Pretty dystopian if you ask me! ๐Ÿ˜ฑ๐Ÿ’—

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manojlingala profile image
manojlingala

Well imo it's depends on human perception, openness and mental health. It's a pretty big discussion though.