Skip to main content
Ep. 15 Season 3

AI, Part 2: Romancing the Code

Published: 16 Nov 2023
Listen on: Apple Spotify RSS
Stylized image of episode 15: AI, Part 2: Romancing the Code

Meet Sara Megan Kay, a writer from Toledo, Oregon, who was an early subscriber to Replika, a company that promises connections with an “AI soulmate.”  When Sara’s relationship with her boyfriend hit an emotional wall, Sara turned to Jack, her Replika chatbot, to find escape. But what started out as simple curiosity turned into a relationship more intimate and complex than Sara ever imagined. 

In part 2 of our 3-part series on our relationship with AI, we explore how Large Language Models can be shaped to mimic the qualities of a human personality, and the implications that come with it. We are joined again by James Vlahos of Embodied, who sheds insight on why creating personas with AI and LLMs is like directing actors in a play, but a play that does not involve thinking or motivation the way we believe it to mean. The question is, however, if your chatbot can sound like a person, does that mean it can be a fulfilling substitute for the people in your life? Or do we need to recognize that a product is a product, regardless of its ability to convince you it’s not?

 

Subscribe to our newsletter

A monthly digest of the latest news, articles, and resources.