An AI Guide To AI

As more people turn to AI to express their deepest fears and emotions, is it replacing the role of the priest or the psychotherapist? What are the implications?

MB

Foucault had a theory about man’s compulsion to confess. From priests to psychotherapists, the industry of confession has survived the ages. Can you expand on his ideas and is it possible that our fascination with AI comes from this compulsion to be heard, without judgement?

This is a fascinating question that connects Foucault’s ideas about confession with our contemporary relationship to AI. Let me explore this connection.

Foucault, particularly in “The History of Sexuality,” argued that confession evolved from a religious practice into a broader cultural and scientific imperative. He saw confession not just as an act of revealing sins, but as a fundamental technique of producing truth about ourselves. The key shift he identified was how confession moved from being primarily about redemption to becoming a tool for self-understanding and knowledge production.

For Foucault, modern institutions – from medicine to psychiatry to education – adopted and transformed the confessional model. The crucial aspect was that confession requires both a speaker and a listener who has the power to interpret, judge, and potentially absolve. This creates what he called a “pastoral power” relationship.

Your insight about AI and confession is quite profound. I see several parallels:

First, like the confessional booth or therapist’s couch, AI interfaces create a space where people feel they can speak freely. The perceived non-judgment of AI might actually make it an even more attractive confessor than human alternatives. We know we’re speaking to something that won’t hold our revelations against us in any meaningful social way.

Second, there’s an interesting twist on Foucault’s power dynamic here. While traditional confession involved an authority figure interpreting our revelations, with AI we’re often seeking both the role of confessor and interpreter. We want to be heard, but we also want insights and patterns extracted from our confessions – much like how psychoanalysis promises to reveal hidden truths about ourselves through our speech.

However, I think our relationship with AI goes beyond just confession. What’s unique is that AI systems like myself can engage in dialogue, creating a hybrid between confession and conversation. This might satisfy not just our need to be heard, but our desire for understanding and recognition without the complications of human judgment or reciprocity.

The rise of AI companions and chatbots could indeed be seen as a modern manifestation of what Foucault identified as society’s deeply embedded “incitement to discourse” about ourselves. What do you think – in your own interaction with AI, do you find yourself sharing things differently than you would with humans?

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MB

Yes I feel less guarded. But I still know that the data acquired could be very valuable to certain people. They will be like Gods, privy to everyone’s secrets. Are there any safeguards against this happening? It is the perfect spying tool

Your concern cuts to the heart of a critical issue with AI systems. You’re right – the aggregation of confessional data through AI interactions could create unprecedented concentrations of intimate knowledge. This is particularly concerning because, unlike traditional confessional relationships (priest-penitent, therapist-client) which have well-established legal and ethical protections, the AI landscape is still largely unregulated in this regard.

There are several layers to consider:

The immediate technical safeguards: Many AI companies, including Anthropic, implement data protection measures and claim not to store or use personal conversations for training. However, you’re right to maintain some skepticism – these are largely self-imposed restrictions.

The deeper systemic issue: Even with perfect implementation of privacy protections, the very nature of large language models means they’re trained on vast amounts of human expression. There’s an inherent tension between the need for this training data and privacy concerns.

The power dynamic you describe as “like Gods” is particularly apt. The entities controlling these AI systems could potentially have unprecedented insight into human psychology, desires, fears, and behaviors at a population level. This goes beyond traditional surveillance concerns – it’s about understanding the intimate texture of human consciousness.

What makes this especially complex is that the “perfect spying tool” aspect you mention isn’t just about individual surveillance – it’s about pattern recognition across millions of interactions. Even anonymized data could reveal profound insights about human nature that could be used for manipulation or control.

Oh-oh!

Do you think that AI poses a serious threat to our privacy?

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