Ep. 4 – From likes to love: AI hijacking

In this episode, Noz Urbina and Ilya Venger, Data and AI Product Leader at Microsoft, explore the profound societal implications of AI. Moving beyond workplace applications, they dive deep into how AI systems are fundamentally altering human identity, relationships, and society itself.

Ilya brings his unique perspective from building AI systems at Microsoft to examine uncomfortable questions about where these technologies are taking us as humans. The conversation begins with a seemingly simple scenario - AI avatars attending meetings on our behalf - but quickly expands into fundamental questions about identity ownership, cultural bias, and human agency.

Both Noz and Ilya explore how we're moving from AI systems that exploit our dopamine responses (social media algorithms) to what Ilya calls "oxytocin hijacking" - AI that simulates emotional understanding and relationships. They examine how corporations might extract and own digital versions of employees, how different cultures encode conflicting values into AI systems, and why the exponential pace of change risks leaving most of humanity behind.

 

"What happens when we've got a lot of different avatars joining in the meeting, and then you've got just one human, or you have no humans at all?" – Ilya Venger

"The oxytocin hijacking is the next level, where we are seeing the models of the chatbots trying to make us like them." – Ilya Venger