LLM-“Friends” are Hostile Scaffolds in the Age of Loneliness

Abstract The use of large language models (LLMs) for companionship is rapidly increasing. As “friends”, LLMs act as scaffolds to the development and enactment of our ongoing comportment, not only with them but also in the broader environment in which we are embedded. From the perspective of scaffolding as it is understood in the philosophy of cognitive science literature, we will argue that LLMs qua “friends” are proving to be damaging to the overall interests of the users who engage with them. We will show that this generally manifests in terms of a growth in the addictive dependency those agents have on LLM-“friends”, as well as the social and moral deskilling they risk suffering, alongside the social demotivation they are likely to experience. Furthermore, we will contend that LLM-“friends” are not only harmful but hostile, whereby the overall interests of the agent utilising the LLM are undermined whilst those of another agent, who was actively involved in the establishment and refinement of the technology, are furthered. This “other agent” is the corporate body that is actively exploiting and profiting from the social difficulties many are currently facing, which are evinced most markedly by reports of rampant global loneliness.