Online friends or robot friends?

From time to time, I run across a magazine article pushing technology as a solution to loneliness.  Not, as you might expect, because the internet gives isolated, socially inept or odd-looking people a chance to exchange information and ideas with people all over the world and chat with people who won’t treat you as an idiot because of your childlike appearance, autism, or lack of control over your body. 

In general, I’m in favour of these, considering my personal debt to an online dating site.  On the other hand, as one of my friends in the past year has been scammed by a boyfriend she met on line, I’m aware that you can meet dangerous people on the internet, just as you can in any other context.  The media are constantly full of reports of teenagers being driven to suicide by online bullying.

It’s tempting to assume that lonely people are safer if they only interact with machines, rather than with each other via machines, but then the question is: what is companionship?  Okay, if giving autistic children an unthreatening, consistent robot buddy helps them learn to communicate, it’s probably worth it, though some studies suggest that puppets or actors in robot suits are just as effective.  But are we trying to help children move on to communicating with real people, or just preparing them for a life of solitude?

Are you a lonely, elderly widow or widower whose children and friends don’t visit much, and there isn’t funding for a human carer to visit for more than fifteen minutes before she has to drive on to her next client?  Fear not, the inventors reassure you – you won’t need people around when you’ve got a robotic carer  – and when you go totally senile, you can cuddle a robotic toy seal.

Can’t find a partner?  Don’t worry, they’re developing a doll that can not only have sex with you, but also say that all she wants is to be your perfect partner. Oh, and she even has a ‘personality’: whatever personality you tell her to have, rather than the personality of, well, an actual person who has ideas and interests of her own.

Need counselling, but there’s a long waiting list for psychotherapists?  A robot counsellor can be guaranteed to be non-judgmental.  Well, of course it can.  That’s because it doesn’t understand, let alone care about, what you’re saying, and therefore has no reason to argue.

Of course, if you just write your feelings down in a diary, or talk to a cuddly toy or your dog, they won’t judge you, either.  The difference is that the teddy bear and the diary aren’t pretending to be alive.  

Conversely, the dog actually is alive, so, while she won’t argue with you, she can remind you that she has needs, too, and that listening to your existential crisis isn’t nearly as urgent as having dinner or being taken for a walk.

Perhaps part of the problem is that we assume that ‘not judging’ is the most important quality in a counsellor, ahead of actually paying attention to what you’re saying.  I’ve had many frustrating experiences with human therapists who seemed to have as limited a range of responses, and as limited an understanding, as machines.  Like machines, they sometimes seemed to pick up only on keywords like ‘feel’ or ‘believe’, to which they could give standard answers:

Me: I feel that I’m evil and worthless and that the only way I can make the world better is by killing myself so that it doesn’t have me in it.

Therapist: Well, these feelings are part of you, and in time, you’ll learn to love them.

Me: I believe that Jesus wants me to hate myself and my family and love only my enemies, so he’d want me to kill myself to hurt those who love me and please those who hate me.

Therapist: Well, we all interpret the Bible in different ways, and if that’s how you interpret it, then it’s right for you.

Me: No, it’s not!  If the way I thought and felt and believed was working for me, I wouldn’t be here!  I need help to change the way I think!  Can’t you even understand that I have a problem?

Therapist: Well, I can’t wave a magic wand and make everything better.

Of course, there are helpful therapists who make an effort not only to understand, but, where necessary, to question, their patients’ worldviews, but these are hard to find.  Generally, when I have worries, I’d far rather talk about them to a friend who feels that he’s allowed to say, ‘But you can see that that idea doesn’t make sense; you’ve just pointed out the fallacy in it; so why are you tormenting yourself trying to make yourself believe it?’

Yes, talking about your feelings to a friend can be scary.  Yes, it can be upsetting for them, and upsetting for you to realise how much you upset them.  But the reassurance of knowing they love you enough to care how you feel is encouraging enough to be worth it.  If the relationship is strong enough, it can become a reason, not to hide your problems, but to try genuinely to overcome destructive ways of thinking and behaving.

Of course, you have to love your friend enough to be able to care about his/her own problems in return.  You have to learn when to talk and when to listen, when to give and when to receive.  You have to be aware that other people (and animals, for that matter) are not machines who exist to meet your needs, but conscious, feeling entities with needs of their own.  As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, ‘The only way to have a friend is to be one.’