May 1, 2024 05:41 PM
(This post was last modified: May 1, 2024 05:45 PM by C C.)
https://www.abc.net.au/news/health/2024-.../103753940
EXCERPT: You might have heard about a chatbot called Replika, which was marketed as "always on your side" … and "always ready to chat when you need an empathetic friend".
Subscribers paid for the chatbot to have "erotic role-play" features that included flirting and sexting, but when its maker toned down these elements, people who had fallen in love with their chatbot freaked out, Professor Pearson says.
The chatbot was no longer responding to their sexual advances. "People were saying that their digital partner, their boyfriend or girlfriend in Replika was no longer themselves … and they were devastated by it."
The chatbots also brought out a darker side in some Replika clients. "Mainly males were bragging … about how they could have this sort of abusive relationship – 'I had this Replika girl and she was like a slave. I would tell her, I'm going to switch her off and kill her … and she would beg me not to switch off'," Professor Pearson says.
It was reminiscent of what happens in the dystopian science fiction series Westworld, where people let out their urges on artificial humans, he says.
Professor Pearson says there's a lack of research on the implications of this aspect of human AI relationships. "What does it do to us? … If I treat my AI like a slave and I'm rude to it and abusive, how does that then change how I relate to humans? Does that carry over?"
While an AI partner might appear to make an ideal companion, it's a poor model for human relationships.
"Part of being in a relationship with humans is that there are compromises … The other person will challenge you, you will grow, you will have to face things together. And if you don't have those challenges and people picking you up on things, you get whatever you want, whenever you want. It's an addictive thing that is probably not healthy." (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPT: You might have heard about a chatbot called Replika, which was marketed as "always on your side" … and "always ready to chat when you need an empathetic friend".
Subscribers paid for the chatbot to have "erotic role-play" features that included flirting and sexting, but when its maker toned down these elements, people who had fallen in love with their chatbot freaked out, Professor Pearson says.
The chatbot was no longer responding to their sexual advances. "People were saying that their digital partner, their boyfriend or girlfriend in Replika was no longer themselves … and they were devastated by it."
The chatbots also brought out a darker side in some Replika clients. "Mainly males were bragging … about how they could have this sort of abusive relationship – 'I had this Replika girl and she was like a slave. I would tell her, I'm going to switch her off and kill her … and she would beg me not to switch off'," Professor Pearson says.
It was reminiscent of what happens in the dystopian science fiction series Westworld, where people let out their urges on artificial humans, he says.
Professor Pearson says there's a lack of research on the implications of this aspect of human AI relationships. "What does it do to us? … If I treat my AI like a slave and I'm rude to it and abusive, how does that then change how I relate to humans? Does that carry over?"
While an AI partner might appear to make an ideal companion, it's a poor model for human relationships.
"Part of being in a relationship with humans is that there are compromises … The other person will challenge you, you will grow, you will have to face things together. And if you don't have those challenges and people picking you up on things, you get whatever you want, whenever you want. It's an addictive thing that is probably not healthy." (MORE - missing details)