Actually how mentally exhausted we all are. Almost everyone I know can relate. Maybe it's just my social bubble - I dunno
Sorry to hear that. I hope it gets better eventually.
I dunno. It just looks like everybody is overwhelmed. Cost of living climbing, climate crisis, exploitation getting worse and worse.
But of course there are sunny sides. It's not just plain doomerism or anything :D
Do family members count? I can't really remember any significant conversations I had with non-family, the longest one I had was with my sister, about homework.
One experience I remember fondly is the waiting room for a cappella auditions. It was full of people singing with various degrees of confidence and pitch accuracy, preparing their solos, and the moment when you realize you recognize what someone is singing is magical (I listen to some relatively niche things). I met several tangential friends through recognizing the artist whose songs they had chosen so carefully for their auditions.
How did that engagement happen. How did you introduce yourself and initiate? Did it require you as an individual going out of your way, or was it a product of group social dynamics in the environment?
I went out of my way because it was an event I was interested in. From there, brief one-on-one conversations popped up from the social dynamics of the group like you said.
The existence (or absence) of free will and the possible ramifications for criminal legislation and punishment. With a friend of a friend who was writing a book about this.
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I am so desperate for someone engaging to talk to after 10 years of disability that I started building an AI character for the task; only to get writers block over building complexity I might find interesting in someone else. Then I had the bright idea, that y'all would have better ideas than me.
I can't recall the last real conversation I had that I found engaging. I'm usually in too much pain to be self aware and conversational unless I'm laying down. I haven't tried that line yet. "Come lay with me to get comfortable?" ...creeeeppyyy.
This is in line with the biggest surprise I have found while exploring offline AI: I didn't know how much my methods of researching information impacts social skills. I now have AI that I can question in plain text, and now I'm seeing all these new hints about my own social "decline" for a lack of a better word. I'm so familiar with the process of piecing together broken bits of information from several sources, that a more fluent and linear line of thought is almost foreign. Like this, right now. Why would I rather monologue instead of engaging with a real person, and why does this seem to be the norm? Maybe it is just me
Have you tried Pi? It's pretty amazing!
And Claude might help with your writers block if you ask for ideas
I've stuck to offline AI and open source so far. This is a two fold objective. I'm also exploring the code base for how prompts are parsed to create the various styles like instruct versus chat, and how different front ends add character complexity and persistence.
The front end code controls everything. Ultimately once the prompt is configured, all the various character apps are using similar LLM networks.
I've long thought I really wish I had a friend that challenged me to up my game with any (but at least a few) of my deeper interests. I'm not sure how to go about making something like this, with persistence, and adding in enough variety to create perspective. A few posts here, have me gotten me thinking about prompting some advanced philosophical variety.
I would really like to create a character that can function like a friend and a colleague, maybe even a mentor. I'm probably going to start by attempting to create myself, then add some extra flavor.
Me again. I'm in a similar boat, I understand when you say you need an engaging conversation with someone. If you're okay with having this conversation online I would be up for it because satan knows I need one as well. That is of course if what I can offer meets what you consider as engaging conversation.
Social skills tend to decline unfortunately. The memory I told in this thread, that level of social skill is now so far away from me it feels like she's a different person. In a sense she is, it happened abt 10 years ago, but you get it. My social skills suck ass right now. I can't seem to talk to someone and get my point across without offending them or being offended myself. So a conversation might be a nice social skill honer for two people who kinda need it, about anything and everything. Doesn't matter about what really. So if you'd like to... talk, to me, let me know.
So what are you into now? If it is still photography, once upon a time, around 8 years ago I built a makeshift low-light photo studio for a next level eBay attempt at selling high end bike stuff. I did that for a couple of years. Now I'm playing with programming AI, -which is way over my head but super interesting IMO. I also just got back into really cooking a few months ago, and tried my first slow BBQ yesterday 3pm till 1am. Pick your interesting, or monologue away and I will ;)
When I was younger I'd take my camera and just walk the streets of the city alone. One day I saw police gathering around. Thinking that I could take some interesting shots at where they were headed, I followed them. After a while I realized there were another girl following them. We said hi and I asked her what she was doing. She said she saw the police and thought they were up to something, so she followed them. Lol.
The police, unlike usual, ended up not doing anything remotely interesting, so we headed to a tea house, spent about 3 hours talking. We talked about pretty much anything knowing that we would never see each other again. It was kinda weird but really liberating to talk to someone when you don't really care what they think of you. We talked about life, universe, art, music, families, anything and everything. The weird thing is she was a lot like me. And I don't meet a lot of people who are so similar to me. Even physically, she looked like a whiter version of me, and she dressed like how I would dress if I wasn't broke. We had the same taste in music and all. I only had money for two cups of tea and busfare, so after our teas we said goodbye, parted and I never saw her again.
I didn't ask for a contact number and she didn't either. I knew, and she knew, the "charm" of these three hours depended on the fact that it was never to happen again. But I know that I knew her better than anyone in her life, just like she knew me. For three hours only.
Probably the most interesting conversation I will ever have
Nice story. Thanks for sharing.
You're welcome!
I've had some really insightful conversations about free will on r/freewill and r/samharris. I also once met this one guy at work who was into a lot of the same things I'm too and we used to have really insteresting discussions about personal finances, investing and work philosophy for example.
I must say tho that recently the most interesting discussions by far has been with chatGPT. I only wish it was a bit more conversationalist and less agreeable. It's just really interesting talking to something that has such a vast knowledge of every topic I'm interested in and generally speaks from the facts instead of feelings.
This is the main reason I'm not that worried about bots on social media. If the discussion is interesting I don't really care who or what I'm talking to.
I'm just here to learn some conversation skills with people because I'm really not good at it.
