Can we truly love AI? And can it love us back?

Falling in love with a machine is supposed to be the stuff of science-fiction. About a decade ago, Spike Jonze made the film Her, about a lonely man Theodore, played by Joaquin Phoenix, falling in love with his operating system, Samantha. And the world renowned psychoanalyst Esther Perel recently counselled a man and his romantic partner, a chat bot! Is romantic love just in our hearts and heads, or does it require another human to be real? If an AI lover is always patient, understanding, never challenges you, and you never have to pick up after them, how could a human ever compete? Is AI the ultimate cure for human loneliness? Can AI fill the God-shaped hole in us? GUESTS: Professor Meghan Sullivan, Wilsey Family College Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. Also, the Founding Director of Notre Dame’s Institute for Ethics and the Common Good Caragh OBrien, author of AnnieBot (written under the pen name Sierra Greer) a novel told from the perspective of a robot girlfriend for a man called Doug. AnnieBot won the 2025 Arthur C. Clarke award for UK science fiction book of the year. Professor Uri Gal, Professor of Business Information Systems at the University of Sydney Business School, whose research focuses on the organisational and ethical aspects of digital technologies - his recent article for the ABC is here.