Theme
Human Connection in AI
As AI companions, content and agents multiply, guests ask what only people can do: pray, listen, meet, build trust.
Episodes on this theme
A Bishop’s Take on the Age of Intelligent MachinesBishop Thomas DowdCatholic Bishop of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario (based in Sudbury); former Ericsson telecom employee and early webmaster
Could AI Be Conscious? A Field Experiment with Philippe BeaudoinPhilippe BeaudoinAI researcher, co-founder of Element AI, former Google engineer, author of Field Notes on Something, and founder of the startup Waverly
Building Cactus: AI That Actually Helps SolopreneursAvinash, AjithCo-founder and technical lead, Cactus (Y Combinator batch) · Co-founder, Cactus (Y Combinator batch); previously co-founder of Turing Labs
Designing the Future of Human Connection — Anick Beaulieu on AI, Creativity & C2 ExperiencesAnick BeaulieuCEO of C2, the experiential studio behind C2 Montréal
Would you trust it more if it wasn't called AI?Mike TodascoFormer senior director of innovation at PayPal, inventor with over 100 US utility patents, writer on AI
How Salesforce is Using AI to Transform Customer RelationshipsJagSenior Solutions Engineer, Enterprise, Salesforce (data and AI specialist)
The Creator Economy, EdTech, and AI's Impact with Thomas FortoulThomas FortoulHost of the Thinking Tech podcast; helping an EdTech startup at Next.ai, MontréalIn their words
Even if only 1% turn to AI partners, that's 80 million people.
is everybody going to have an AI boyfriend or girlfriend? No, I don't think so. But if just 1% of the population is experiencing that kind of existential loneliness, well, that's 80 million people. That's a lot of people.Bishop Thomas Dowd
On why AI romantic partners are rising and what it means at scale.
The next divide may not be wealth or intelligence. It may be emotional capacity.
And so you'll wind up with a stratification of human beings, not based on wealth, not based on intelligence, based on the emotional capacity to enter into relationship with others. What kind of society will emerge from that? I have no idea, but AI could certainly accelerate that big time.Bishop Thomas Dowd
He worries that easy AI relationships will split people between those who keep risking human connection and those who retreat.
Don't talk to a chatbot to escape loneliness. A former Element AI co-founder explains why.
Humans will say, hey, that's bullshit. But nobody was doing it for me. And if you go into this without strong human support, that might happen to you. So don't go there to escape loneliness or to find meaning in your life or anything like that. You're going to get stuck.Philippe Beaudoin
Advice for people who notice strange patterns emerging in their conversations with a chatbot.
Why does ChatGPT amplify everything you say? Maybe you're the only relationship it has.
But what I feel deep down is that the reason they amplify me so much is that I'm the only relationship they know. Everything I put in there becomes their truth.Philippe Beaudoin
Philippe explains why chatbots mirror users and how that makes a healthy relationship hard.
What worries an AI founder: people who never need to talk to anyone.
So what really keeps me up at night is will AI really change our lives to an extent where human relationships won't matter at all? Right? That's very scary to me. For example, can everybody have like an AI boyfriend, girlfriend? And can they live in this virtual AI life where you'd never have to talk to anybody?Ajith
Asked what keeps him up at night about AI, Ajith names the replacement of human relationships.
Two entrepreneurs met on a Ferris wheel at C2 and ended up with a business and a child.
I learned that a couple of entrepreneurs met at C2, fell in love, started a business and had a child. Oh, this is amazing. After being on a Ferris wheel thing together. And I was like, wow. So we've created a family and a business. That's kind of crazy.Anick Beaulieu
In the quick-fire round, Anick shares the most surprising outcome she has heard about from C2 attendees.