My recent post on cognitive surrender generated more response than almost anything I’ve written recently. I think it’s because people recognized something uncomfortably familiar in themselves. The shift of difficult thinking to artificial intelligence (AI)—the preference for frictionless answers over human cognitive efforts—had struck a nerve, or perhaps a neuron.
This recognition made me wonder whether the same erosion was occurring somewhere else—in how we relate, not just how we think.
When Human Connection Starts to Feel Like the Problem
I think it’s fair to say that human relationships are complicated because we humans are complicated. People misunderstand us as they bring their assumptions and distractions into every interaction. Yet much of what makes relationships meaningful emerges from precisely these imperfections. A close friendship is rarely built on perfect understanding but the process of understanding itself. This effort isn’t incidental to the relationship. In many ways, it is the relationship.
It’s my contention that AI offers a very different experience. When people turn to AI for emotional support, it responds patiently and without any clear judgement. There’s a seamless engagement with no interruption or competing priorities. For many people, this can be genuinely useful. AI can help organize thoughts and even manage anxiety.
The concern here isn’t those benefits. It’s that repeated exposure to frictionless emotional support may gradually alter our expectations of what emotional support should feel like.
Human expectations are adaptive. We acclimate to new conditions and begin treating them as normal. Think about what that means here. After enough interactions with a large language model that never judges you or has a bad day, the engagement doesn’t feel optimal but deficient.
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