Why We Don't Need Chatbots to Be Adult Barbies

I was around 5 years old when my grandfather got me a Barbie doll. It was one of the best gifts not because it fulfilled my wish, but because it taught me how to imagine.

Almost 20 years later, I see everyone playing with a Barbie these days. No, not because of Greta Gerwin’s movie, but because of the rise of chatbots.

Emerging technology is the mirror that reflects human nature at a surface level; be it our aspirations, curiosity, or imagination.

“The size of the chatbot market is forecast to reach around 1.25 billion U.S. dollars in 2025” according to Statista. In the consumer markets, this trend has manifested itself as the rise of character.ai, Replika, Meta AI bots, and other NSFW chatbot companies.

I ran the Semrush analysis and Character.ai’s largest age group of website visitors are 18 - 24 year-olds. You’d notice similar stats for the C.ai’s competitors.

On the other end, nearly 1 in 4 adults feel lonely worldwide, reported CNN. In 2019, more men felt lonely, with 63% compared to 58% of women. Young adults aged 18 - 24 years old are the loneliest generation as per research.

So how does this paradox of ‘being more connected than ever before, yet being lonelier than ever’ work?

Let’s understand some factors of Human Connection proposed by Brené Brown:

1. Empathy: The ability to understand and share the feelings of another.

2. Vulnerability: The courage to be open about feelings, failures, and imperfections.

3. Authenticity: Showing up as one’s true self, without pretense or posturing.

4. Courage: The strength to be vulnerable and authentic, especially in the face of fear or judgment.

5. Compassion: Offering kindness and understanding to others and oneself.

6. Belonging: The sense that we are part of something bigger, accepted for who we are.

7. Trust: Building a foundation where individuals feel safe to be vulnerable and authentic.

Now a small exercise:

Read each point one by one. Raise a finger for each point that you feel is present in your life in general. Pay close attention to your feelings and thoughts while doing this.

How many fingers did you raise? Which people, events, places, or memories come to mind?

So after finishing the exercise, do you really think a chatbot can replace the depth of the experiences you feel with real humans?

No matter how perfect, a chatbot will not be able to replace a real human in our lives. Not because chatbots are our fantasy of anthropomorphizing machines, but because real people are imperfect. And it’s in their imperfections that we can trust, empathize, be compassionate, show vulnerability, and whatnot! It can be extremely difficult to connect with others sometimes, but it is in the courage to show up regardless that we learn to nurture our connections.

The current trends of using AI chatbots emerging as romantic or sexual partners, therapists, teachers, doctors, etc. is literally humanity deceiving itself with its own imagination. Can we blame LLMs for hallucinating, when we as humans can’t differentiate reality from fiction?

As we grow, we realize that Barbies don’t feel in real life, that our soft toys didn’t need warm blankets, that the characters in our picture books didn’t look back at us, or most importantly, that there were no monsters under our beds.

While using chatbots as a means to reach the end goal of self-improvement, self-acceptance, and self-love might work, making them an end in themselves may really ruin humanity.

We need to start asking the right questions. Our answers and understanding are only as good as our methods of inquiry.

We wonder, “How can we use technology to build a better future for humanity?”. But not, “Why do we think the present is worse than the future? And how do we even define better or worse?”

We wonder, “Is life possible on other planets?”. But why not, “Why do we want to meet someone like us out there in the universe?” or, “If humanity is at risk of extinction, then why are we still motivated to date AI chatbots?”

We wonder, “Does greed lead to climate change?”. But not, “Why do we feel greedy? Why are we so unfulfilled with the present that we’re ready to rob the future generations of nature’s goodness?”

We wonder, “How can we eliminate pain and suffering?”. But why not, “Why do we think pain and suffering are so evil that they should be eliminated?” or, “How can we manage pain and suffering that it can teach us acceptance and is still not unfair to the now who is in pain or is suffering?”.

We wonder, “How can we replicate consciousness using AI?”. But not, “Why do we want to replicate it in the first place?”

We wonder, “Why are we so lonely and how can we solve it?”. But why not, ” Why do we isolate ourselves in our mental cages?”