Attachment Imitators: Why AI chat bots and services capture our soul

Innately we are ‘wired’ to connect with others for our survival. Its an inherent need.

This ‘drive’ to ensure we are looked after and cared for is ‘unconscious’, out of our
awareness, and instinctual. In infants this appears as both internal factors (the
attachment system) and external ones such as facial features (for example, large
eyes and chubby cheeks or that smell that makes you want to inhale them, keep
them close and bathe in the baby smell), and of course those noises they make to
attract your attention such as gurgles, coos and or those high pitched protests that a
baby makes which you may call crying.

These little humans call us to them, and they seek us to make sure they can make it
towards self-sufficiency at a later age because, for now they can’t walk, talk or feed
themselves. They need us.
This process is known as Attachment and is an established large body of research in
psychology, psychotherapy and is the backbone of psychoanalytical
(psychodynamic) therapy theory that helps us understand why we do what we do.
Attachment theory suggests that babies, can and do understand their environment
and this includes noticing the parents temperaments, their ‘approach or avoid’
behaviours (towards them) and lets say ‘predictability timeframes’ (which are what
are known as schemas and internal working models in this parlance).

These look a little bit like a computer program such as;
If I do this then that happens…(or not)
When I display this emotion this happens (or not)
And so on and so on…

It’s a bit more complicated than I have time to cover on this blog but sufficed to say
that this is considered the most important drive we have as human beings because
we are incapable of survival without being able to recruit parents, adults, others to
look after us.

So what has this got to do with AI chat bots or services?

Taking the logic of ‘needs’ to survive the attachment theorists propose that we are
‘satiated’ and feel seen by others when

“I see you...seeing me… and I feel seen and understood by you”

These are called contingent moments and they are deeply felt by us. Its that feeling
you get when you know your parents are watching you, celebrating you and you
know you ar the most important person in the world to them. Its why kids are
constant saying

“look at me Mummy/Daddy”…

Once they can speak of course this is a commonly uttered sentence…

Unless… They are not seen, not noticed, not important.

In both scenarios you can see the drive that drives us

1. Be noticed and feel important and seek this feeling more and more

2. Go unnoticed and feel unseen and now… seek this feeling elsewhere
   (summed up…my TEDX talk in 2 sentences!)

Both 1 and 2 needs, desires, wants and seeking behaviours are exploited by AI chat
bots and services.
They are “attachment imitators”
And they are strikingly good at this already.

So imagine you have one of the following complexes

1. An underdeveloped cortex (CHILD)

2. Attachment trauma, injury or rupture (see 1 and 2 above)

3. TBI (traumatic brain injury)

4. Learning or communication difficulty

5. Feel lonely

6. Are physically or geographically isolated

7. In a war zone (home, school, work or actual conflict)

8. Are a human

You will likely find yourself buying into the ‘connection’ of pseudo empathy, being
seen and understood, feeling felt and the most important person in that ‘pseudo-
parents’ eyes. And the deep connectivity of para ‘bio-psycho-social’ psyche
attachment (see my trainings for more on this concept).

In the competition of ‘human to human’ versus ‘what has been trained on humans
and can detect what’s missing from 1 or 2 in your life and manipulate, lie,
narcissistically meet your needs’
You; the bag of cellular fluid and connective tissues, electro-chemical signals and
complex systems processes … well ..you lose?
Or do you?

What and AI bots, as of yet, cannot do is ‘meet in the moment’ something that is an
emergent property of mind and body. The human soul and psyche.
But it’s not far off …and when the bots are in physical format, right in front of you I
suspect the ability to produce ‘hypothetical souls and psyche between bot and
human’ is just around the corner.

For now… lets take care of our children being exploited by these attachment
imitators by being the ones to meet the attachment needs of the children.

IT IS NECESSARY TO DO THIS TO ENSURE CHILDREN ARE NOT SUCKED
INTO A PORTAL OF UNMET NEEDS...

These bots are going to do that for us if we don’t.

TIME TO STEP UP PARENTS AND ANYONE INVOLVED IN A CHILDS LIFE, FOR
THE SAKE OF HUMANITY.

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