Artificial Intimacy

“A love letter to humanity written by a woman of brilliance and heart.”―Priya Parker

“A necessary exploration of what happens when we seek the comforts of connection over the demands of relationships.”―Esther Perel

“[Turkle is] the most qualified member of Team Humanity to call us back to our senses, and to each other.”―Jonathan Haidt

From the bestselling author of Reclaiming Conversation, an urgent warning about how our ever-increasing reliance on AI chatbots is eroding our capacity for the very qualities that make us human.

If social media came for our attention, artificial intelligence is now coming for our capacity for attachment. Chatbots offer themselves as best friends, lovers, and psychotherapists—but when we allow AI to fill these roles, we accept as sufficient its mere performance of intimacy, empathy, and love. We begin to think that pretend empathy is empathy enough. The consequences are profound and troubling: Technology, by offering to do everything, is teaching us that we neither need nor have the capacity to take risks, have hard conversations, struggle through uncertainty and insecurity, or rely on our own faculties and judgment. In the process, it is producing a generation more alienated, depressed, and lonely than ever before.

In Artificial Intimacy, Sherry Turkle—the psychologist who pioneered our understanding of human-computer relationships—draws on vivid stories as well as decades of experience as a chronicler and analyst of digital culture to present an urgent warning about what these “perfect” companions are doing to our minds and relationships. Tracing our new habit of talking to machines through the human lifecycle—from children’s earliest attachments to how we face death—Turkle offers both a cautionary tale and a roadmap for reclaiming our humanity in the age of AI.

• “All around us, people are beguiled by the siren song of artificial intimacy. Sherry Turkle's 40 years of groundbreaking research and beautiful writing make her the most qualified member of Team Humanity to call us back to our senses, and to each other.”
  Jonathan Haidt, author of The Anxious Generation
• “The best thing I’ve ever read about one of the biggest questions of our time: how will we relate to machines as they become more like us? Sherry Turkle’s book is insightful, emotional, rigorous, and deeply human. Read it cover to cover and absorb its wisdom; don’t, whatever you do, just ask a bot to summarize it.”
  Nicholas Thompson, author of The Running Ground
• “Sherry Turkle, our wisest guide to digital life, has written her most urgent book yet. Artificial Intimacy will help you avoid the profound but often hidden threats AI poses to you and your relationships. Read it and share it with all the humans you know.”
  Nicholas Carr, author of The Shallows
• “The preeminent sociologist of smart machines, Sherry Turkle, now writes against the techno-utopianism of our time and the promise of frictionless intimacy, chronicling the distinction between virtual and actual human community and connection.”
  Michael Sandel, author of The Tyranny of Merit
• “A necessary exploration of what happens when we seek the comforts of connection over the demands of relationships.”
  Esther Perel, author and host of Where Should We Begin
• “Sherry Turkle is the exact right person at the exact right time to write us this exact book. Artificial Intimacy is a love letter to humanity written by a woman of brilliance and heart.”
  Priya Parker, author of The Art of Fighting
• “Our relational nature as human beings is being colonized by machines that cleverly exploit our longing for human connection, simulate intimacy, and ultimately entrain us into a world of pretend — artificial intimacy. May this book reinforce our commitment to trust and inhabit our analog nature as human beings, and resist wholesale digital capture.”
  Jon Kabat-Zinn, author of Wherever You Go, There You Are
• “Artificial Intimacy could not come at a better time as society grapples with how to navigate the AI revolution. It helps us make sense of what this new and rapidly evolving technology is doing to our humanity and what we must stand up and protect. Sherry Turkle’s wise words of caution and counsel should be read by those developing AI and all who use it.”  
  Vivek Murthy, MD, author of Together
• "A pointed critique of the growing impact of artificial intelligence on human relationships . . . [Turkle] urg[es] readers to question whether these tools enhance or inhibit personal growth. Harrowing and poignant, this timely warning deserves to be widely read."
  Publishers Weekly (starred)
• "A gifted writer . . . [Turkle] organizes her book to follow a range of people at every stage of development, from youth through adulthood—people who have, alarmingly, moved beyond engaging AI chatbots for simple conversation or pure utility and come to rely on the technology for emotional succor . . . A strong case for why we should resist the urge to replace human bonds with AI."
  Kirkus Reviews (starred)