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Contd.. And as technology improves, the difference between turning to a computer to find another person to interact with and the computer simply taking on the role of that person is going to become increasingly marginal. How many of our emotional needs can be met by synthesised solutions? And what about physical needs? There will conceivably be a time in the distant future where we won't think twice about embarking on a sexual adventure with a robot, but if we start withdrawing from society in the meantime because computers provide a less troubling alternative to humans, can we really get by on mental stimulation and masturbation alone? Forget post-nuclear scenes of devastation – that's a bleak dystopian scenario if ever there was one. But Her negotiates that bleakness and makes viewers sigh wistfully, because Samantha ends up taking on human traits – embarrassment, jealousy, fragility, instability. And while computers of the future with the power of one brain, a thousand brains or a million brains may be able to feign such emotions, no mystery lies behind them; this has been achieved by circuitry that requires electrical power to function. Call me an insufferable romantic, but love requires that mystery in order to blossom. It requires us to overcome the inevitable tension that occurs between two people who are in the business of exercising their own free will, to realise that our appeal lies in our faults, and to understand that the connection between two people is fragile, ever- changing and ultimately finite. OS1 and similar operating systems of the future may make for rewarding purchases, but we'll surely retain our need to be alternately infuriated and delighted by each other's humanity. Women will still seem confusing, men will keep being bastards, and as Theodore's friend Amy puts it, lucidly and perceptively, falling in love will continue to be "a form of socially acceptable insanity".