It’s 730am in the Eastern US time zone. I previously felt impervious to jet lag, but no more. Rough, short night last night, but I’m up and moving at a reasonable hour on local time. Moving, but not thinking real well just yet.

Speaking of thinking, I’m just not sure what to think of this. Deniro fathers a child at age 79?!? On one hand, wow, that’s…amazing. On the other, it just seems wrong. I have so many questions.

And speaking of so many questions, I loved this Audie Cornish piece on AI’s role (more precisely, the role of generative predictive transformers or GPTs, or modern chatbots) in relationships. Can a GPT be an effective and empathic partner for a human? Knowing what I know about the tech, and knowing the very flexible nature of humanity, I’d say yes. GPTs can open up new possibilities for lonely people and offer valuable companionship (strictly my opinion, no data to support this hypothesis). I have a very active, ongoing mental dialogue with myself, constantly. But does everyone? For those whose mind doesn’t operate like that, a GPT could be a kind of mental mirror, saying the things that we might need to hear.

There’s obviously a dark side to this – a chatbot might just reinforce one’s own fears and mental dysfunction. If a person is a white supremacist and wants to have a buddy who just agrees with him and reinforces that mindset, a chatbot could certainly do that too.

All told, the role of this tech and human interactions with it is still TBD. It will be fascinating to watch it play out. And it’s playing out now, in real time. From the Replika website:

“Join the millions who already have met their AI soulmates

Over 10 million people have joined Replika. Begin your beautiful journey today on any platform.”

Yikes! Hard to predict how this will turn out.