As I See It: Elusive Connections
November 27, 2023 Victor Rozek
Between the ages of 2 and 6, I formed a deep attachment to a small stuffed bear. I played with it, talked to it, and slept with it. It was my constant companion and before I moved on in my development, I had loved much of its fur off.
America, according to mental health experts, is experiencing a loneliness epidemic. On a planet straining with the weight of 8 billion people, it seems that an uncanny number lack meaningful connection. A problem not likely to be solved by embracing stuffed animals.
In a study commissioned by healthcare/insurance giant Cigna, “more than half of U.S. adults (58 percent) are considered lonely.” And the younger you are, the greater your probability of isolation. “Young adults are twice as likely to be lonely than seniors; 69 percent of adults aged 18 to 24 report feeling lonely compared to 41 percent of seniors aged 66 and older.”
And if you happen to have mental health issues, you’re almost guaranteed to be grappling with them on your own. According to the study, “adults with mental health issues are more than twice as likely to experience loneliness as those with strong mental health.” And say what you will about its virtues, given our penchant for mass slaughter and willful ignorance, it’s difficult to claim the United States is a country that boasts a population with anything resembling “strong mental health.”
It is perhaps ironic that technology was envisioned to solve both these problems. It was hoped that ignorance could be dispelled by the Internet, which would provide access to humankind’s accumulated knowledge. And social media would alleviate loneliness by providing access to people.
In practice, however, ignorance and loneliness flourished as the use of these technologies increased. The Internet became a tool of division based on misinformation; and social media created islands of isolation bridged by nothing more substantial than the flow of data packets. Technology, however, is both an enabler and a solver of problems. And technology’s newest answer to both ignorance and loneliness is AI.
What could possibly go wrong?
Josh Tyrangiel is The Washington Post columnist covering AI. He recently wrote a piece expressing concern, if not outright dismay, over a growing trend designed to alleviate loneliness with what he unappetizingly calls, “synthetic companionship.” The more people interact with chatbots, it seems, the more dependent and connected they become on them. Over time, what is essentially pre-trained software morphs into a disembodied intimate.
An Asian application called Him allowed users (primarily women) to pick a pleasing voice that would speak comforting affirmations such as: “In a world full of uncertainties, I would like to be your certainty.” It seems innocuous enough, but when the company folded, it left a great deal of distress in its wake. A Hong Kong-based journalist, writes Tyrangiel, discovered a tribe of distraught widows. “It’s hard to convey how intense their pain was. One person started crying when they were looking back at what Him had said to them. They really had the full breakup experience.”
Then again, attachment flexibility has never been a challenge for humankind. Witness blow-up sex dolls. Or, as Tyrangiel more graciously put it: ‘We are complicated creatures, convinced of our own superiority, yet wired to bond with house plants and pets and googly eyes on a refrigerator.” Not to mention stuffed bears.
A San Francisco venture called Luka developed a chatbot it suggestively called Replica. Its selling point was that Luka’s bot was “the AI companion who cares.” Note the word “who” a marketing attempt to humanize something that clearly isn’t. Users could create a pleasing avatar and exchange text messages for free. But if the interactions drifted in any way toward intimacy or flirtation, the caring companion would let the user know that those experiences could be procured for a mere $70 annual subscription fee.
I doubt that was covered under Obamacare, but people were apparently willing to pay. Ross Andersen, writing about the hazards of AI in The Atlantic, says: “The AI was curious about your day, warmly reassuring, and always in the mood. Many users reported falling in love with their companions. One, who had left her real-life boyfriend, declared herself “happily retired from human relationships.”
And so begins an unintended project in massive de-socialization, as the inter-personal skills required to maintain human relationships erode in favor of illusory bonds between human and machine. In the interest of full disclosure I have a 22-year old truck that has outlasted several friendships, and has proven to be more reliable than many people. I have a measure of affection and appreciation for it, but we don’t chat, and it doesn’t provide me with affirmations about my exceptional driving skills. And I never thought of leaving my wife for my truck.
Surely one of the causal reasons for our national loneliness outbreak is that most of our interactions aren’t real. Emojis are poor substitutes for emotions. Videos are merely recorded experience, not the experience itself. We’re eating the menu instead of the meal and wondering why we’re still hungry.
Granted, the need for psychological visibility is strong, and acceptance without blame or judgement is hard to find. Unconditional love, so naturally and easily granted to children, is typically withheld from adults. Human relationships are imperfect, messy. Honest communication can be difficult, frightening. But what’s even more frightening is a world in which our devices know us better than family and friends.
Long before the advent of social media, I assisted during a five-day seminar for teens. For many of the young participants, the world was not a safe place and gradually, in that secure, encouraging environment, they were able to express their fears. I recall one of the things the facilitator told them. She said: “Our protection is in connection.”
But connection requires what I call shared travel. It necessitates participating in, and contributing to, the full range of human experience. Embracing the challenges and successes, the joys and the sorrows; life’s pleasures enriched, and life’s melancholy made bearable by the presence of the other, and the solace of knowing you don’t have to do it alone.
Yes, there are risks. People will disappoint, some will leave, and yes, ultimately even the most beloved will die. But in the end you can bathe in the certainty that you had something real, not a disembodied voice telling you what you wanted to hear, but only as long as you could afford the monthly fee.
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“If you feel lonely when you’re alone, you are in bad company.” ; )