AI Love: A New Way to Connect or a Threat to Our Humanity?

Are relationships with AI just a gimmick or the next step in our evolution

Are relationships with AI just a gimmick or the next step in our evolution

Photo by Alexander Sinn on Unsplash

What are some of the top 5 most important things in your life? Financial security? A fulfilling career and life purpose? Something else?

I have a feeling that for you, one of those top 5 priorities will be your relationships with other people whether it’s your partner, your family or friends.

Some people are claiming to be having relationships with Artificial Intelligence.

Is this a gimmick? Do you feel worried that this might be a potential threat to human relationships?

I very much believe we are at a significant turning point in human history and with human relationships.

One way or another, the nature of your relationships and of people you know I think is going to change significantly over the next few years, due to the impact of AI.

I also believe the best way you can navigate this, is for you to better understand what and why this is happening.

Human Technology & Relationships Through History

While mobile phones and the internet are recent things, since the start of human history, we have been a technological species

Our first use of Stone Age tools included flint arrowheads for hunting, chopping and cutting over 2.6 million years ago.

Human communication and relationships have been continually affected by the technology we invent.

We used pigments over 350,000 years ago to draw cave paintings that allowed people to communicate and relate to each other over both time and space and many generations.

Eventually, around 8,000 years ago we started to develop written language, again using technology to enable humans to relate to each other over great distances of time and space.

We went from cave paintings to symbols and writing, to radio, the telephone, the internet, to WhatsApp.

So when we remember history, I think you can see like I do, that the technology we invented has always transformed human relationships.

How our latest technology affects human relationships

Recently Spanish artist Alica Framis hit the news when she declared she would be becoming the first person to marry an AI hologram.

On her website, she describes her intention for this ‘project’:

We know that soon robots and humans will be sexual partners, but for me, the next important step is emotionally involving artificial intelligence with humans. Holograms are more closely related to my feelings than robots, therefore I choose to develop a hologram rather than a robot.

So perhaps you are thinking, ok but this is just a gimmick.

You’re thinking — is not a real relationship, this is an artist trying to make a provocative statement, this has nothing to do with real human relationships or how they will develop in the future. Right?

But let’s first remember a little recent history…

During the last 25 years, we have had the internet. People could share writing and content across the world, instantly with anyone.

More recently we developed social media and instant messaging like Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Twitter (X), and so on.

Part of this has meant that human beings have got much more comfortable at communicating primarily using these methods, to the extent that many have worried about how social media has led to people connecting less in real life.

I have a theory about all of this i’d like to share with you, about how human communication transformed by technology has been developing over the whole of human history.

My personal theory of the evolution of human relationships

My theory is essentially that:

Human communication and relationships has been getting more abstract and dis-embodied over time, and that as time progresses this trend is getting stronger

The most fundamental human relationships are of course in person.

And we still do this of course.

But what I’m proposing is this is happening less and less over time, and that our tendency to abstract our relationships away from direct in-person relationships is getting stronger over time.

First, it was cave paintings, later stone burial mounds, then writing, radio, the telephone, the internet, social media, to instant messaging.

And now it’s ChatGPT, which I think in the context of our history, is perhaps just the next obvious step.

How the Human-Digital-Human evolves into the Human-Digital

Many of our most important human relationships with friends and family are now mediated mostly by text messages

We chat about our day, ask for opinions and advice, and share our lives, our worries, our hopes and dreams — our most intimate moments, all by text.

And now we have AI like ChatGPT, that fits right into the way we connect with our most important relationships, by text.

Now we can also chat about our day, ask for opinions and advice, and share our lives, worries, hopes and dreams — our most intimate moments, with AI and ChatGPT if we want to.

But perhaps you are thinking, why would anyone want to do that?

Well, you might be surprised to find, that some people might very well want to now and in the near future, and for reasons you might even be able to understand…

What do humans need from relationships?

What do you think you need from relationships? is it companionship, love, inspiration, a listening ear, or support? Something else?

We’re at the paywall. If you want to know what AI means for society with my weekly articles & podcast, with expert analysis of key AI developments and their impact, explained in plain english. Join today for monthly or annual subscription. Hope to help you get smarter about what AI means for society.