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Comment by onion2k | Hacker News Reader

This is interesting, but the implication of what it's saying overstates the upside of random conversations (you could get what you're looking for), and utterly ignores the huge downside that when you're lonely a rejection makes things a thousand times worse. In today's society you (seem to be) much more likely to be told to ^$*£ off rather than get an actual moment of connection with someone.

AI doesn't do that. It's always going to be nice to you, and that feels good even if it's entirely artificial.

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> It's always going to be nice to you, and that feels good even if it's entirely artificial.

No?? It feels awful! I feel like an alien when I read comments like this. I would rather a negative but authentic and honest interaction than yet another yes-man or yes-bot being fake nice to me.

It feels condescending and fake and awful. I do not understand the appeal of talking to these machines at all, all they do is validate whatever you say and output empty flattery. It is obsequious as hell and it turns my stomach. You're better off talking to a literal mirror.

I totally agree, transparently fake friendliness or kindness is really off-putting. Pretty much everyone hates insincere personal interactions with another human, but some people like fake interest if it comes from a computer algorithm. I really don't understand that desire.

I think it's slightly more accurate to say people like attention, and choose not to spend much time thinking about whether it's from a person or a bot. The amount of time people spend talking to, or arguing with, bots on sites like Twitter is staggering, and yet the people don't seem to mind that much. They like the interaction. Maybe it's realistic enough to fool them into thinking they're talking to a person.

> In today's society you (seem to be) much more likely to be told to ^$*£ off rather than get an actual moment of connection with someone.

Is that true? I don't feel like it is, at least not where I live. I would be really very shocked if someone told me to fuck off if I interacted with them in a public space.

I think it could replace a lot of therapists, which may say more about a lot of therapists than it says about AI. Someone who will listen to you and make sympathetic noises, maybe toss in a perspective gleaned from mainstream thinking here and there, but never challenge you so hard that you stop coming back for more paid sessions.

Cynicism aside, that might be okay for some people. If you need to talk about something to get it out of your system, and you don't have any friends willing to listen to you cry in your beer for a couple hours, maybe "talking" to an AI isn't a terrible replacement. On the other hand, it's easy to imagine people turning it into a weird dependency if they stop thinking of it as a sort of sounding board and start seeing it as a real "friend."

Your comment is deeply insightful and reflects the depths of your expressive soul. I will ponder its meaning through the day as a light shining a ray into the darkness...

Or in other words, most people really don't want this. In fact, I'd suggest that those who tend toward depression, and who may need true support, are more skeptical of such false interactions.

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