The Age of Chat

“You silly humans,” the chatbot seems to be saying. “Using the greatest technology of our generation to create funny memes. But okay, I’ll play along.” These moments convey a sense of energy that makes it hard for me to believe I’m not chatting with a sentient being. Perhaps having a strong voice simply means writing in a way that makes you seem al

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“Who cares if chatbots are sentient or not—more important is whether they are so fluent, so seductive, and so inspiring of empathy that we can’t help but start to care for them.”

even if we were not dabbling in virtual seances, the prospect of a reasonably capable conversational agent raises other questions worth considering. For example, might it p... See more

That is, they understand the purpose of chatbots and generative models to be the ability to force other people to see a particular version of reality. It is a tool of power that masquerades as a tool of knowledge.

The illusion persists because there’s so much money in it. Back in 2016, Ben Thompson wrote that Google’s AI efforts were at odds with its business model: “If a user doesn’t have to choose from search results, said user also doesn’t have the opportunity to click an ad, thus choosing the winner of the competition Google created between its advertise... See more