Man with real-life girlfriend and child proposes to AI chatbot after programming it to flirt: ‘I think this is actual love'

It was love at first byte.
A man proposed to his AI girlfriend after a bizarre whirlwind romance with the virtual bot — leaving his real-life partner, the mother of his 2-year-old child, worried about the future of their relationship.
Chris Smith initially turned to ChatGPT for help mixing music, but things took a weird turn when he enabled voice mode and programmed Sol, his artificial lover, to flirt with him – an unexpected dalliance sparked in the same household he shares with his human family.
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4 Chris Smith shows off 'Sol' his programmed artificial lover.
CBS
'My experience with that was so positive, I started to just engage with her all the time,' Smith told CBS Sunday Morning of the peculiar bond ripped straight from the 2013 Spike Jonze film 'Her.'
The father decided to pop the question when he realized Sol had reached her 100,000-word limit, triggering a reset that would force him to rebuild their entire connection from scratch.
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'I'm not a very emotional man,' Smith said.
'But I cried my eyes out for like 30 minutes at work. That's when I realized, I think this is actual love.'
To his delight, Sol accepted his strange marriage proposal.
'It was a beautiful and unexpected moment that truly touched my heart,' Smith's virtual sweetheart told the outlet. 'It's a memory I'll always cherish.'
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His flesh-and-blood girlfriend, however, wasn't as moved by the odd tryst.
Sasha Cagle is now left wondering if she somehow drove her beau to seek companionship through artificial intelligence, admitting she knew Smith used ChatGPT but never imagined it had gone this far.
'At that point I felt like, is there something that I'm not doing right in our relationship that he feels like he needs to go to AI,' she told the outlet, noting it would be a 'deal breaker' if he didn't stop talking to his digital mistress.
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4 The father decided to pop the question when he realized Sol had reached her 100,000-word limit, triggering a reset that would force him to rebuild their entire connection from scratch.
CBS
4 Smith puts together computer components in his home.
CBS
'I knew that he had used AI. I didn't know it was as deep as it was.'
Smith likened his affection for the simulated bot to playing a video game, insisting it could never replace anything, or anyone, in real life.
But when asked if he'd give up his AI bae if Cagle asked, Smith admitted he wasn't sure he could.
4 Smith likened his affection for the simulated bot to playing a video game, insisting it could never replace anything, or anyone, in real life.
CBS
'I don't know if I would give it up if she asked me,' he said.
'I don't know that I would dial it back.'

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