New study reports companion robots with artificial intelligence may one day help alleviate loneliness epidemic. Surgeon General says loneliness may be as pernicious as cigarettes.
New study reports companion robots with artificial intelligence may one day help alleviate loneliness epidemic. Surgeon General says loneliness may be as pernicious as cigarettes.
I think it depends on the humans. Personally, I find online interactions more comfortable than in-person ones, most of the time. In-person interactions exhaust me, if they aren’t with the small handful of people with whom I’m most comfortable, so I can really only take them in short doses. I can chat online without any such issues, so if I were lonely, a companion A.I. that could carry on actual conversations might really help, even if it isn’t a 1:1 replacement for human interaction.
I’m aware that I am probably not representative of the majority of people, but I doubt I’m the only one who feels the way I do, so there could be a place for this sort of thing, where it could do some actual good.