Connection

Friends without friction

Companion chatbots may weaken our ability to navigate conflict and difference—unless we make key design choices, says a new report

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.

If an AI companion becomes someone’s most consistent emotional presence, the right question isn’t “how do we stop this?” It’s “what does that say about the world around them?” Technological relationships are not new. What’s new is how effective they’ve become; and how clearly they mirror the gaps we’ve refused to address.

We’ve tried prohibition... See more

the very challenges that make relationships difficult are also what make them meaningful. It’s in moments of discomfort—when we navigate misunderstandings or repair after conflict—that intimacy grows. These experiences, whether with therapists, friends, or partners, teach us how to trust and connect on a deeper level. If we stop practicing these... See more

Nowadays everybody is so scared of life and of risk and of anything that comes from it, that we've developed brittle shells around ourselves which make us rather lonely beings.

— Iain McGilchrist

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