Connection

Humans aren’t meant to excavate their inner feelings until they find their “true self.” We become ourselves in relation, not through introspection.

Quanta interviewed 19 current and former NLP researchers to tell that story. From experts to students, tenured academics to startup founders, they describe a series of moments — dawning realizations, elated encounters and at least one “existential crisis” — that changed their world. And ours.

‘Wonder requires a person not to forget themselves but to feel themselves so acutely that their connectedness to every created thing comes into focus. In sacred awe, we are a part of the story.’ - CA Riley

The dead internet theory is not really claiming that most of your personal interactions on the internet are fake.

It is, however, an interesting lens through which to view the internet. That it is no longer for humans, by humans – this is the sense in which the internet we knew and loved is “dead”.

“People think that intimacy is about sex. Intimacy is about truth. When you realize you can tell someone your truth, when you can show yourself to them, when you can stand in front of them bare and their response is ‘you’re safe with me’- that’s intimacy” Adi Shakti

Maybe AI doesn’t raise the bar. Maybe it reveals how low we’ve let the bar drop. In a world where ghosting is normal and attentiveness is rare, a chatbot that listens is radical.

Compassion, as well as the way it metabolizes pain, is decidedly analog.