On October 14, MIT professor and bestselling author Sherry Turkle will join mindfulness pioneer Jon Kabat-Zinn at All Souls Church in New York City for a live conversation about Turkle's new book, Artificial Intimacy: Who We Become When We Talk to Machines. The event, produced by Steve Stein and WisdomFeed Publishing, marks the third conversation between the two thinkers and the first held before a live audience. It arrives at a moment when artificial intelligence is moving beyond productivity and into the deeply human realms of companionship, empathy, advice, loneliness, and relationships.
Turkle's book, published September 29 by Little, Brown and Company, examines what happens when people turn to machines not merely to accomplish tasks but for forms of emotional connection once reserved for human relationships. In earlier online episodes of the StreetSmart Wisdom Podcast, Turkle framed the stakes starkly: "This is a break the glass moment. How are we going to govern? How are we going to think about the challenge we face?" Kabat-Zinn approached the same convergence through the lens of analog humanity: "What is happening now is the convergence of the analog and the digital in such a way that we had best... realize the full dimensionality and potential of the analog world before... we lose it to... fake empathy from machines."
Those questions have only grown more urgent as conversational AI becomes embedded in everyday life. Turkle has asked whether pretend empathy is enough, and how people with a gift for real empathy can still connect. The October 14 event puts those concerns at the center of a public dialogue, bringing together Turkle's decades of research on technology and identity with Kabat-Zinn's decades of work on mindfulness, awareness, and presence. Kabat-Zinn founded Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, and his work helped bring mindfulness into mainstream medicine and culture.
The implications extend beyond one book or one evening. As AI systems become more adept at mimicking emotional support, the conversation raises fundamental questions about what is lost when efficiency and simulation replace the slow, imperfect work of human presence. Turkle and Kabat-Zinn are not arguing against technology; they are asking what kind of attention and governance are required to keep human connection from being quietly outsourced. The live format, held at 80th Street and Lexington Avenue, deliberately brings these ideas "down to street level," as WisdomFeed puts it, after two online conversations.
WisdomFeed Publishing creates audiobooks, podcasts, journals, courses, and live experiences at the intersection of technology and humanity. With StreetSmart Wisdom Podcast: IRL, it is bringing Turkle and Kabat-Zinn together for the third chapter of their continuing conversation. The event will be held both in person and via livestream, and Turkle will sign copies of Artificial Intimacy following the program. Information and registration are available at https://wisdomfeed.thrivecart.com/artificial-intimacy/.
For a culture increasingly shaped by machine-mediated interaction, the October 14 conversation offers a rare public forum where two leading thinkers ask not just what AI can do, but who we become when we talk to machines. The answers may influence how individuals, institutions, and policymakers approach the emotional dimensions of artificial intelligence in the years ahead.
