Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less From Each Other

Early on in Chapter 1, Turkle writes, “at the robotic moment, more than ever, our willingness to engage with the inanimate does not depend on being deceived but on wanting to fill in the blanks” (24).She names this the “ELIZA effect” after the students’ tendency to ask the basic program questions that it could answer and “that would make it seem more lifelike” (23).This tendency for the user to “help” the robot that can’t yet carry on a conversation in a convincingly human way or to supply his or her own rationalization for glitches is what Turkle means when she says we are drawn into “necessary complicities” (86). There is some desire in us to help these robots seem more alive in order to receive the reward of their companionship.

This comes up again and again in the book. When Cog, the social robot, malfunctions or breaks, the children ask if it is sick and are keen to help it get better. Behind this impulse, Turkle tells us, is “a wish to come ever closer to our creations—to be somehow enlivened by them” (129).