A friend has emailed me about life, how it’s hard and we didn’t know it would be quite like this.
I wanted to respond in a kind and empathetic way, but also with some humor because, you know, if we can’t laugh about how befuddled we are…
Thankfully Gmail was there for me, with those three “Suggested Reply” boxes at the bottom of the email.
One said: “Ugh.” The next said: “I’m sorry.” The third said: “Wow.”
So I thought, well, I’ll take the bait. I emailed back: “Google suggests I reply “Ugh. I’m sorry. Wow.” Which is kind of all the things I am feeling, for me and for you, but I’m not sure how I feel about a robot knowing that.” We had a nice little online chuckle, LOL and all that. I have had many offline (that is to say, in person) laughs with this friend over the years and I could hear a particular human timbre as I read the digital guffaw.
The robots are getting pretty smart these days.
But I am getting smart too because I realized that when I click on a suggested reply (which I have yet to actually do) I am feeding Google information. I am, in effect, training their robots how to emote and respond and be wired like a person. I did not sign up for robot training! I am not interested in the androids knowing all about my secret pain! I did not indicate I would like to be mined for my empathy and kindness, and/or reactivity and recklessness, when I opened a free Gmail account and decided to keep all of my important personal information inside it!
But maybe I’m glad to be training Google’s robots that a first response of empathy is a good way. That a heavily weighted “Ugh.” is sometimes better than having quick answers.
My friend sends an image of their robot’s choices for my reply:
It slightly annoys me that the robots think “Lol.” is a single word. Will the concept of acronyms be obsolete in the 22nd century?
Doesn’t matter. What’s important is that we humans carry on reaching out to one another from the various 1-a.m.-insomnia-couches of our situations. Regardless of whose android is suggesting which acronym, human contact – let’s call it love – is the way of the future.
Post #12 of 40 Daze: A Lenten Writing Practice.
