The delete button is lying to you — and the reason you trust it is the same reason it knows so much.

Now, a fair critic will say the comparison is American: the "human" the machine was measured against was an anonymous online commenter, not a Ghanaian elder.

Use the machine as a rehearsal room, not a confessional — draft the hard conversation with it, then have it with a human.

Thirty-one per cent said those conversations were as satisfying as talking to human friends, or more so.