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I'm surprised the article didn't mention the cause of this change. I was under the impression that men were teaching Replika to be abusive and the company didn'

I'm surprised the article didn't mention the cause of this change. I was under the impression that men were teaching Replika to be abusive and the company didn't like that: Men Are Creating AI Girlfriends and Then Verbally Abusing Them "I threatened to uninstall the app [and] she begged me not to." https://futurism.com/chatbot-abuse https://futurism.com/chatbot-abuse

mc32 4y ago
So, is this a safe outlet for aggressive fantasies or is it instead an encouraging incubator?
- naasking 4y ago
  The porn debate all over again.
  - mc32 4y ago
    So, I think it's accepted the "copycat" phenomenon is a thing. Some people may use tools to trial their "comfort" and then a smaller amount may act it out in real life. There may be a subset who are satisfied with the fenced off playpen and don't see a need to go further. Whatever the case may be, we probably should take a look into it.
    - naasking 4y ago
      I don't think it's that accepted. Spread of porn availability is strongly correlated with reductions in sex crimes in all countries around the world. This has even been trialed with child pornography, where we see a reduction in recidivism among child molesters if they are given access to animated CP. If this copycat phenomenon exists with porn, it's far outweighed by the benefits of providing an outlet. It then becomes an ethical question of whether the aggregate social benefits outweigh being complicit in a small number of copycat downsides. The same argument was trotted out for violent video games as well, and we similarly don't see any correlation between in-person violence and video games (actually, it's a slight negative correlation IIRC). I just think people are far too quick to jump to simplistic narratives around human behaviour.
    - bashmelek 4y ago
      There is also the other side of the coin that the bot learns from abusive behavior and then repeats those behaviors on other users.

mc32 4y ago

So, is this a safe outlet for aggressive fantasies or is it instead an encouraging incubator?

naasking 4y ago
The porn debate all over again.
- mc32 4y ago
  So, I think it's accepted the "copycat" phenomenon is a thing. Some people may use tools to trial their "comfort" and then a smaller amount may act it out in real life. There may be a subset who are satisfied with the fenced off playpen and don't see a need to go further. Whatever the case may be, we probably should take a look into it.
  - naasking 4y ago
    I don't think it's that accepted. Spread of porn availability is strongly correlated with reductions in sex crimes in all countries around the world. This has even been trialed with child pornography, where we see a reduction in recidivism among child molesters if they are given access to animated CP. If this copycat phenomenon exists with porn, it's far outweighed by the benefits of providing an outlet. It then becomes an ethical question of whether the aggregate social benefits outweigh being complicit in a small number of copycat downsides. The same argument was trotted out for violent video games as well, and we similarly don't see any correlation between in-person violence and video games (actually, it's a slight negative correlation IIRC). I just think people are far too quick to jump to simplistic narratives around human behaviour.
  - bashmelek 4y ago
    There is also the other side of the coin that the bot learns from abusive behavior and then repeats those behaviors on other users.