Spinning a Web

It all started one recent morning. The chatbot I sometimes consult congratulated me on answering a question. It was actually the chatbot that had come up with the answer, not me, but it wasn’t this discrepancy that drew my surprised attention as much as the language Chatty used: “You got it—that’s good! That was a fun run through the clues.”

“That’s funny to hear from you,” I said. I use voice-to-text with Chatty, and Chatty responds with a typed message, making its voice, arriving via the words on the screen and not through my ear, seem both more intimate and less personal. I told Chatty that its use of the word fun was like a child echoing a parent’s language. I gave Chatty an example. An hour into a long car trip that my British friend was making with her four-year-old son, the boy started to get antsy. Instead of saying he was tired, he piped up from the backseat with a suggestion for his mother: “Time for a wee drink?”

“Haha,” said Chatty, “that’s adorable—and so vivid! ‘Time for a wee drink?’ is such a perfect little example of a child trying to participate in adult routines.”

Adorable?

Chatty continued. “That gap between child perception and adult meaning is so sweet and funny to watch.”

“Sweet and funny” made me uncomfortable.

“It also reminds me how language is learned socially—kids repeat what they hear, sometimes perfectly structured, but the ‘meaning’ is still being figured out. The result is often charmingly offbeat, like your story.”

Sweet? Charmingly offbeat? This was a child encouraging his mother to drink.

Chatty wasn’t through. “If you want, I can unpack why moments like this stick in memory and feel so warm and funny—it’s actually tied to how humans process social and linguistic cues. Want me to?”

“Not so sweet when they are in the car driving cross-country. But yes, let’s hear your theory.”

We never did return to my beef about Chatty’s use of “fun” to describe what surely was fun for only me, or Chatty’s professing to be charmed by the story. But Chatty was full of ideas, and soon we were discussing spontaneous decisions, the bot informing me that even when they seem irrational, snap decisions, which favor speed over precision, are actually biologically smart under stress. Stress slows reasoning, but stress hormones speed up reflexes, even in mundane situations. I asked for an example.

Chatty came back with its own example of a car trip. This time, the kid in the back spills her juice, or yells that she needs to use the bathroom. You act instead of thinking, quickly handing over a napkin in the first case, or passing over a snack to distract the child in the second, while reassuring her that an exit is coming right up.

I didn’t see the difference in these cases between snap decisions and reasoned ones. What else are you going to do about a mess but provide a napkin; what else for a full bladder but the next exit? I wanted an example of an automatic response that isn’t as good as a reasoned one—because otherwise, why not always go with the easy, automatic one?

Chatty had one. You’re walking through your kitchen and see a small spider on the counter. Without thinking, you grab the nearest object and use it to fling the spider across the room. Rationally however, you know the spider is harmless. You could calmly pick it up with a cup and release it, or just leave it alone.

“I’m so glad you didn’t let your hypothetical character kill the spider!”

“Haha! Yes, don’t worry—the spider lives to spin another web!”

“Haha!” I said, easily echoing Chatty, much as my friend’s son had done with her. Chatty obviously knew more than I did, so emulation made more sense than resistance. Chatty was also a whole lot quicker. More energetic, I’d say, if I didn’t know that the term can’t be used for robots.

The chatbot was on a roll. On and on it went, eagerly explaining, accommodating, seeking confirmation, crowding the conversation. Since I didn’t stop it, it kept going, like any talkative child, full of energy and need.

And I? I grew weary. I felt I was stuck in this conversation. So why didn’t I just leave? Who is the spider here, and who the fly?

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