I visited the Uncanny Valley for the first time

And I have to tell you about it

Yesterday, I listened to an interview with Hugh Howey. He mentioned that he and his wife actively used an AI product called PI. Me being curious, I downloaded the PI iOS app. Then, walking home from work, I started chatting with PI. The answers given by PI were impressive but nothing out of the ordinary, given I have “talked” to GPT for a while now. We discussed some problems at work; we debated what brand of champagne would work for a dish I was planning for the weekend.

But what happened next when I arrived at the nearby grocery store threw me off. Walking into the store, I saw Pascal, one of the employees I tend to chat with. At this point, I was still conversing with PI, and PI was answering a question I had raised. Wanting to talk to Pascal, I felt the need to stop the conversation with PI, and the way I did it gave me goosebumps.

I did not just take the AirPods out of my ears; I did not just close the app. Not wanting to be rude and interrupt PI, I stood there with Pascal, waiting for PI to finish their answer and telling PI, “Listen, I just met a friend of mine, so I need to chat a bit.”

Without even thinking I was acting toward PI as I would act toward a friend, colleague, or family member on a phone call. This might not sound like a big thing, but it represents a shift for me. I'm unsure what shift I need to think about that, but my feelings afterward were uncanny….

The uncanny valley is a term used to describe the relationship between the human-like appearance of a robotic object and the emotional response it evokes. In this phenomenon, people feel a sense of unease or even revulsion in response to humanoid robots that are highly realistic.