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China bans AI “boyfriends” and “girlfriends” over addiction and birth rate concerns (www.dexerto.com)
submitted 2 months ago by to c/technology@beehaw.org
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[–] 16 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I'm a bit confused as to why this is related to 1984. I understand banning AI “boyfriends” and “girlfriends” could be seen as a form of censorship, though. But I also think it’s kind of a good thing; some people genuinely believed these AI were their real relationships and might avoid any real relationships.

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  • [–] 9 points 2 months ago

    It is a sarcastic observation of the shallow and reductive take that "nineteen eighty four is when the government does something i don't like!".

    I find it less likely that anyone who uses lemmy would sincerely think it is actually good that people become parasocially addicted to a hallucination box that has been finely tuned to lie to them as convincingly as possible.

    However, I admit this inference is doing a lot of gravy lifting; this is, after all, why Poe's Law exists. There are so very many excessively dim, narrow-minded, and ignorant people who WOULD indeed unironically cry "1984!!" whenever any government does anything that such a person being right here, right now, is always a statistically significant possibility that cannot be dismissed out of hand without risk.

    I am giving the person to whom you are replying a generous benefit of a doubt, to be fair...

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