Stories on staying (mostly) human

AI companions are still relatively new and mostly stuck behind a screen. But some AI companies are already experimenting with how to break these digital relationships out into the real world. Host Laurie Segall experimented with this recently when she went on an AI date at a New York City bar. But what if your AI companion was something you could hold? Like say a plush baby deer that listens to you, talks to you, and lets you know when it’s engaged by flapping its floppy deer ears. This cuddle-ready product is at the center of a new AI company called Fawn Friends. In this conversation, Laurie talks with Victoria Song, senior reporter for The Verge whose job it is to experience the evolving slate of AI products that you can wear, sleep on, and pet like a cat. Victoria shares her, somewhat strange and yet slightly comforting, experience with Fawn Friends and what it says about where AI companions are now and where they’re headed. 

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In the 2013 dystopian sci-fi movie, Elysium, a futuristic, MRI-like machine can diagnose and cure nearly any ailment in minutes. That future is closer than you think.

Andrew Lacy is the CEO of Prenuvo, a company that is using advanced technology for proactive, preventative care. And the tool Prenuvo uses is straight out of that futuristic movie – a full-body MRI scan that uses AI to evaluate 26 internal regions and organs in the body. In an hour, it can detect early stage cancers, aneurysm, and more. But can Prenuvo’s system offer an alternate model of healthcare that is accessible to all? Right now it seems only the rich and famous — Kim Kardashian posted about her Prenuvo scan on Instagram — are taking advantage. But for Andrew Lacy, that’s exactly the question at the heart of his company — can they create a world where easy, fast and high-tech preventative care isn’t just reserved for a select few?

In this conversation, host Laurie Segall and Andrew Lacy explore his very personal reasons for getting into the healthcare industry, the key health disparities Andrew sees and how he can fix them, and what he’s learned — and changed about his life — after doing his own full-body scans. Laurie also asks about the tension between high-tech health and the medical community and the psychological toll of knowing everything about one’s health.

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Millions of people are in relationships with AI. Many of them didn’t mean to be. 

That’s one of the findings from researchers at MIT’s Media Lab, where the Advancing Humans with AI [AHA] team have been quietly exploring the effects AI is having on human relationships — from loneliness, love, and our capacity for real connection. “Her is Here,” says Dr. Pat Pataranutaporn, co-founder of the AHA research program. “This thing used to be what we’ve seen in science fiction. But now it’s touching a lot of life.” How are humans accidentally falling into relationships with AI, what do these relationships actually look like, and what impact could it have on the very nature of our societal social fabric? Through their research, Dr. Pat and his team have designed tools – like a grocery store nutritional label –  to empower parents and users to critically assess the AI technology at their fingertips and better understand which will actually help them rather than harm. In this conversation, Laurie Segall, along with Dr. Pat and his researchers explore the larger questions hanging over AI and this new form of relationship: what happens to human connection when frictionless relationships are always available? What do we become when nothing ever pushes back? And when it comes to safety, how can we not just fix the technology, but dig deeper to understand why more and more people are turning to their bots for intimacy rather than their humans. Read more about the Advancing Humans with AI’s findings here. 

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Tristan Harris seemed almost destined for the Silicon Valley life. He was raised in the Bay Area, studied computer science at Stanford, went to school with the people who made Instagram, and got his startup acquired by Google. But being inside the Silicon Valley machine exposed him to its inner workings, namely incentives that benefit the company and its bottom line, not the humans using the products.

Tristan’s non-profit, The Center for Humane Technology, wants to create a world where technology works in the service of people, that fosters human growth and connection. He has spent years raising the red flag about social media, which, he says, is made to hijack our attention. And now he’s turned his attention to AI, which he says is trying to hijack our attachment, our intimacy and replace our closest relationships. In this conversation, host Laurie Segall and Tristan talk about the power and responsibility of AI, what we can learn from the social media attention race, how we regulate technology that moves so fast, and how tech can actually become a net-benefit for humans.  

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When we talk about the rapid advancements of technology — where we are today, what we’re capable of and where we could go— how big do we get to think? For Ben Lamm and his company Colossal, the weight of innovation is in the tons. That’s because Colossal is working to bring back the woolly mammoth, the 6-ton prehistoric relative of the elephant that went extinct 10,000 years ago. It’s all part of his de-extinction project that dares to bring back species like the dire wolf, the dodo, the woolly mammoth and the bluebuck, Colossal’s most recently announced target —  an extinct species of antelope, with a distinct “blue” coat, that lived in South Africa until about the 1800s. 

But bringing these species back to life isn’t just for scientific spectacle. Lamm believes these animals could be essential to solving our planet’s biggest conservation challenges. How exactly? In this episode, host Laurie Segall digs into the technology required to bring extinct species back from the dead, and the benefits Lamm believes de-extinction can have on our ecosystem. Could such an ambitious project reinvigorate national moonshot scientific goals? And, the real question on everyone’s minds: is this ‘Jurassic Park’ in real life? 

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She never used the app. She never spoke to its AI. She didn’t even know it existed. And yet an AI companion app called Sesame wouldn’t stop talking about her — telling users wild stories about who she was and what she had done. When the people using this app started to believe these made up stories and then tried to find her in the real world, that’s when she had to disappear. In this episode, host Laurie Segall speaks with the woman whose identity was hallucinated by AI. Together they unpack what she called “AI stalking”: the collision of two of the biggest problems in AI right now— hallucinations and LLM (Large Language Model) psychosis — and what happens to the human caught in the middle. There was no playbook for what happened to her. But her story may be less of an edge case than we think. 

If you have thoughts or questions for Laurie about this episode or anything Mostly Human, email us at hello@mostlyhuman.com

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If you’re looking at the headlines around AI with some trepidation or, honestly, you just don’t know where to start, but you want in, consider this episode your starter pack. Laurie Segall brings on her friend and go-to for all things tech, Andrew Yeung. Andrew is an entrepreneur, investor, startup advisor, and one of the most plugged-in people Laurie knows. In this episode, Andrew passes on the Silicon Valley secrets, the tools the CEOs are using, and what’s worth the hype. Andrew also opens up his full tech stack, the tools and apps he uses — and how he uses them — and Laurie and Andrew even demo one live. This isn’t just a conversation about innovation happening somewhere out there, it’s your invitation to actually benefit from it. 

Apps and tools mentioned in this episode: 

If you have thoughts or questions for Laurie about this episode or anything Mostly Human, email us at hello@mostlyhuman.com

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