Why Can't We Be Friends?

your AI 'friend' is probably a psychopath.

Davi Ottenheimer wrote an interesting article entitled Your AI 'Friend' Is Probably A Psychopath: How Buber Warned Silicon Valley To Build Better.

He talks about Martin Buber's I and Thou, where Buber explains,

"The world is twofold for man, in accordance with his twofold attitude."

And Ottenheimer explains that according to Buber, we either treat what we encounter as an It, something to be experienced and used, or as a Thou, something we enter into genuine relationship with, and how there is an evolution of human-technology relationships,

"A hammer is just an It, a simple extension of the arm that requires nothing from us but proper use. A power saw demands more attention; it has needs we must respect. A prosthetic AI limb enters into dialogue with our body, learning and adapting. And a seeing eye dog?"

And Ottenheimer issues a warning to AI tool builders,

"Either build AI that can enter into genuine relationships, maintaining its own integrity while engaging in real dialogue, or admit you’re just building tools and drop the pretense of friendship."

The implication is that AI tool builders are capable of building integrity into their creations, The kind of integrity possessed by a seeing eye dog.

The problem with that is that a seeing eye dog knows how to love. A machine can never know how to love. Knowing how to love is something only God can teach. AI tool builders will never understand it well enough to teach it to machines. They will never know how to manufacture friends.