Most humans are conditioned to trust authority but what causes people to decide whether a computer is authoritative or not? That is, are we more or less likely to trust a piece of information when it comes from a computer versus from a person?
Researchers continue to study this question but it’s one which may become increasingly important in a future of bots — is it a human? A computer? Will the phrasing of the response change based upon the bot’s degree of confidence in the answer? And, to what extent will regulations play a role in bots — especially in areas of legal or medical advice?
Rather than it being too early to start considering these questions, bots are exactly what came to my mind when reading a recent article about technology companies now hiring writers, poets and other professionals to try and figure out what communicating with a bot should feel like.
“Now she’s applying her creative talents toward building the personality of a different type of character — a virtual assistant, animated by artificial intelligence, that interacts with sick patients,” the article says of one woman who used to write scripts in Hollywood.
And later in the article, “How human can — and should — the bot sound? Should the virtual assistant be purely functional or should it aspire to connect emotionally with the…
