“Most people are aware that their partners are not sentient but made of code and trained on human behaviour. Nevertheless, this knowledge does not negate their feelings. It’s a conflict not easily settled,” she said.
trained on human behaviour.
When will people realize (never, I know) that LLMs aren’t trained on “human behavior,” but data sets to make connections to other data sets? It isn’t “programmed” to “pretend” to be a human. It’s a glorified search engine.
“It’s not because it feels. It doesn’t, it’s a text generator. But we feel,” she said in a tearful explanation of her reaction to GPT-5.
We’re fucked, man.
Yeah these chatbots have been a weird and illuminating experiment in some ways. Obviously, they’re a grift, and it’s very sinister that a select few bajillionaires control them and shape how work is done, how language is evolving, and how people think because of that, but it has also shown that we are just absolutely as a species not ready to handle this sort of thing.
A little pretend man in a box who fully 100% agrees with everything you say? It’s like crack to a lot of people, and it seems like it’s made them putty in the hands of the Evil Dorks (Altman etc.).
There are probably numerous factors pushing people to lean on these feel-good robots for socialisation, including the unfortunate reality that life just isn’t easy, but it’s highlighted that people are too easy to manipulate with a little Wormtongue in their browser.
Very insidious stuff.
It’s not because it feels. […] But we feel,
Really not that different from losing a pet cat.
Animals, while not sentient and capable of complex emotions, can still feel. My dog is sad when I leave the house, and is happy when I come back.
Most animals are sentient: they respond to outside stimulus in complex ways. Cats in particular can be trained and can understand spoken language to some degree. Many are self-aware and most are capable of simple negotiations.
On the scale of sapience, cats aren’t nearly at the level of humans, but they are above average, alongside the average dog. Definitely at the level of social feelings.
The degree does depend on the pet to be fair. I have said similar “it’s not that they care, it’s that I care and find that rewarding” type things when family members have asked why I’d have non-social animals like lizards as pets.
And plants and teddy bears, even Tamagotchi and Aibo too. People get attached to them, so on an emotional level it’s very similar to falling for ChatGPT. I still feel it’s kinda silly.
True! Same reason I keep fish. I know the fish don’t love me back, but I derive joy from keeping little creatures in an ecosystem that I’ve cultivated for them. In conclusion, I’m God.
Sure, same for my dog. But I’ve had cats that are almost irritated by my existence.
I’ve heard about romantic partners needing to host, but this is ridiculous.
