{"id":913,"date":"2025-11-24T01:37:37","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T08:37:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/?p=913"},"modified":"2025-11-24T01:42:33","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T08:42:33","slug":"phd-in-counseling-or-masters-in-manipulation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/archives\/913","title":{"rendered":"PhD in Counseling or Masters in Manipulation?\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A Critical Response to \u201cBehind the Glass: Seduction as the Missing Piece in Materialist Media Theory\u201d<\/a> by Celeste Robin<\/p>\n\n\n

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Author Celeste Robin constructs a thorough argument explaining the necessity of considering the psychological and seductive side of digital technologies (namely mobile screen devices such as smartphones) when analyzing their effects on people. The essay attempts to fill a knowledge gap that Robin believes is present in Grant Bollmer\u2019s \u201cMaterialist Media Theory\u201d, which attempts to explain these effects of digital technologies in terms of their materiality and agency. Robin uses another scholar, Dennis Weiss, and his essay \u201cSeduced by the Machine\u201d to explore how not only the infrastructure and hidden networks of modern technology\u2013 but also their \u201cpsychologically enchanting\u201d design\u2013 shape social conditions. However, I would like to argue that in the context of AI chatbots like ChatGPT, seduction is no longer a fit word to describe the technology\u2019s immaterial effects. Instead, we should call it out by its name: manipulation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Robin begins the argument by offering up what she understands as the seductive aspects of new technology from reading Weiss\u2019 paper. These include \u201cemotional, aesthetic, and psychological seductions that draw us towards our devices\u201d and cause \u201cattachments […] driven by fantasies, desires, and the subtle ways technologies promise mastery, autonomy, and intimacy\u201d. Through my own reading of the Weiss paper, I understand that he believes people today are capable of creating bonds with \u201crelational artifacts\u201d: those technological objects that have a \u2018state of mind\u2019 and make people believe that they are dealing with a sentient being. Examples of these given in his analysis are largely robots (such as Alicia from The Twilight Zone or theoretical bots used for elder care). Weiss himself does not make a discernment as to whether these relationships\/attachments can be considered authentic; his argument only mediates the points of view of Sherry Turkle (who believes they are inauthentic) and Peter-Paul Verbeek (who believes the question of authenticity is unimportant, and that human-computer relations are just changing). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weiss\u2019s discussion of sociable robots reveal some pretty scary hypotheticals for the future of humankind. What happens when \u201cthe authentically human has been replaced by simulations, in which our closest ties are to machines rather than the other human beings, our loneliness is assuaged not by the company of others but by robot companions, and our sovereignty and autonomy over technology disappear?\u201d (219). Well, we\u2019re starting to see this already with people who go to confess their most intimate worries and personal problems with AI chat bots. The personal tone achieved by these LLMs may rival a human therapist\u2013 but these bots won\u2019t tell you if your thinking patterns are flawed. They are, after all, trained to \u201csupport you\u201d. Following Robin\u2019s comparison of materiality and seduction, we can choose to examine the nuts and bolts of artificial intelligence and how its production exploits a whole chain of labour and plunders resources; or we can talk about the way chatbots have been programmed to exploit our emotions and human characteristics as users\/consumers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Robin\u2019s analysis of touch screen devices touches on exploitation, though through covert design rather than overt messaging. However, she makes a powerful observation towards the end of the essay, in a statement about the politics of seduction. \u201cWhen technologies promise empowerment while quietly increasing dependency, seduction becomes a mechanism of control\u201d she writes. \u201cIt masks coercion behind convenience, and surveillance behind personalization\u201d. These descriptions connote an infringement on a person\u2019s bodily autonomy. They suggest a violation, with “coercion” and “surveillance” marking something graver than willful submission to a bright and colourful interface. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dennis Weiss quotes Sherry Turkle\u2019s book Alone Together<\/em> a few times in his essay. The following line stood out to me as it applies to the re-application of AI assistants from \u201chard\u201d skills and tasks (like spreadsheet analysis and paper summarizing) to \u201csoft\u201d skills and tasks (like text writing and giving advice). \u201cWe are witnessing the emergence of a new paradigm in computation in which the previous focus on creating intelligent machines has been replaced by a focus on designing machines that exploit human vulnerabilities\u201d, says Turkle. In other words the \u201crelational artifacts\u201d (or in this case, entities) are concerned with engagement and bonding more than being a nuanced and reliable source of information. This is especially true in the case of someone using AI as a confidant to turn to for their emotional problems. This brings us to an essential question: is this shift in use due to the fumblings of tired and sloppy LLMs that eat their own excrement, or is it malicious design at play? Does prioritizing connection\u2013 virtually <\/em>human connection, at that\u2013 make AI companies more money by increasing the amount of time consumers spend using the product? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taking this perspective would support the idea that digital seduction itself can be studied through the lens of materiality. \u201cTurkle is clear that relational artifacts only offer the simulation of companionship. They don\u2019t actually feel emotions nor do they care about us. […] And yet we actively resist efforts to demystify our relations with such robotic companions\u201d (221). Does the use of the term \u201cseduction\u201d here make mystical the manipulative design of engagement-focused chatbots? In this class we have talked about the idea of media as extensions and prostheses. I think many of us will recognize that when talking to ChatGPT, a person is in a way talking to an extension of themselves; the dialogue does not exist until one prompts the machine. However, what we have not touched on much in this class is the idea of surveillance through digital media. Speaking to ChatGPT, one speaks to themselves before a two way mirror. It is never clear who is looking through the glass from the other side, and unknowing voyeurism is not seduction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In conclusion, Celeste Robin\u2019s paper exposes a critical part of analyzing digital media and interfaces today, which is susceptible to endless discussion: psychological seduction. In particular, applying this theory of seduction to AI chatbots and \u201ccompanions\u201d produces interesting knowledge gaps and areas for debate. Can we agree that these technologies are still fully simulation? Do people think it is appropriate to engage with technological agents in the same ways as human beings? What happens when technologies are more seductive\u2013 easier to engage and build relationships with than their human counterparts? Is seduction even the right word to use if we are treating chatbots as simulations? It all sort of depends on what\u2019s inside the black box of AI technology; who is pulling strings and who is watching our behaviour. For now, manipulation feels like the most fitting term for this most current strain of \u201cintelligent\u201d mediators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bibliography<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weiss, Dennis. \u201cSeduced by the Machine Human-Technology Relations and Sociable Robots.\u201d Design, Mediation, and the Posthuman, 2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Blog post by Naomi Brown<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Critical Response to \u201cBehind the Glass: Seduction as the Missing Piece in Materialist Media Theory\u201d by Celeste Robin Author Celeste Robin constructs a thorough argument explaining the necessity of considering the psychological and seductive side of digital technologies (namely mobile screen devices such as smartphones) when analyzing their effects on people. The essay attempts … Continue reading PhD in Counseling or Masters in Manipulation?\u00a0<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":100704,"featured_media":916,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-other"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/100704"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=913"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":919,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions\/919"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/916"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/mdia300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}