Love in the Time of AI with Kashmir Hill

Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel

Esther Perel Global Media

Society & Culture, Education, Health & Fitness, Mental Health, Self-improvement

4.7 • 16.4K Ratings

🗓️ 1 June 2026

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A recent session was a threshold moment for Esther where she found herself doing couples therapy with a man and his AI companion. To explore the questions it raised, Esther sits down with New York Times technology reporter, Kashmir Hill, who has spent years reporting on the growing world of AI relationships. They explore the psychological pull of these systems, the design choices behind them, and the deeper human needs they tap into. When a chatbot can mirror your thoughts, validate your feelings, and never turn away, where does connection end and illusion begin? PLEASE NOTE The Times sued OpenAI in 2023, accusing it of copyright infringement. The company has denied those claims. Also, please join me on Entre Nous, my new home on Substack for anyone who wants to live, love, and work with more connection and imagination. I invite you to sign up and become a free or paid member at estherperel.substack.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	We're living in a moment where the lines between an AI tool and an AI companion are fast blurring.
0:08.9	And on a recent session for the podcast, I saw my first couple's session that had a human, a man, and an AI, his companion.
0:19.5	And at one moment in the session, he tells me that he felt more understood by his AI chatbot
0:25.6	than by anybody else.
0:27.6	And so I wanted to have a conversation with someone to help me sort out my thoughts and my reactions
0:32.6	to this session, which for me was really a threshold moment. And so I thought of Kashmir Hill,
0:40.1	who reports for the New York Times and has been writing about AI and technology for more
0:46.1	than a decade. And especially I thought of her because of two podcasts episodes that I had
0:51.3	heard with Irene and her relationship with her AI companion, Leo,
0:56.5	and especially the second session when Irene breaks up with Leo.
1:02.1	And for all of that and more, I thought Kashmir would be a wonderful interlocutor
1:07.0	to have a conversation about love and AI.
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