• Broadfern@lemmy.world
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    15 hours ago

    We see faces in fucking wall outlets. I could give a pencil a name and the next three people I talk to will form empathy with it.

    People are desperate for connection, and it’s sad.

    • Blueberrydreamer@lemmynsfw.com
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      9 hours ago

      There is absolutely nothing sad about that, it’s beautiful. That tendency is the only reason we have any form of civilization, so I’d say it’s worth people occasionally empathizing with pencils.

    • Hegar@fedia.io
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      13 hours ago

      I love this about us.

      It’s just delightful how many situations our brain is willing to shrug and say “close enough” to. Oh wait the pencil has a name now? I guess it must be basically the same as me.

      If I pretend an object is talking, my partner will instantly feel bad for how she’s treated it.

      It’s not sad, it’s just how brains are.

      • MudMan@fedia.io
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        12 hours ago

        I’m perpetually mad at having a global conversation about a thing without understanding how it works despite how it works not being a secret or that complicated to conceptualize.

        I am now also mad at having a global conversation about a thing without understanding how we work despite how we work not being a secret or that complicated to conceptualize.

        I mean, less so, because we’re more complicated and if you want to test things out you need to deal with all the squishy bits and people keep complaining about how you need to follow “ethics” and you can’t keep control groups in cages unless they agree to it and stuff, but… you know, more or less.

    • Denjin@feddit.uk
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      15 hours ago

      It’s just natural human instinct. We’re programmed to look for patterns and see faces. It’s the same reason we attribute human characteristics to animals or even inanimate objects.

      Add to that the fact that everyone refers to LLM chatbots as humans and this is inevitable.

      • clif@lemmy.world
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        9 hours ago

        I learned the other day that a few people (devs) I know and respect have pet names and genders for the LLMs they use and converse with them regularly.

        I’m rethinking some of my feelings about those people.