People feel things reading books, watching movies, even animated ones that have no people in them, looking at abstract art... Why should this be any different?
Do you take eg advertisement at face value? Even when you know they're trying to convince you to accept some idea of the brand and buy something?
Do you think Buzz Lightyear actually exists?
You're missing the point. I'm not talking about the actual content but the intentions of creating said content.
I get the point, I just disagree with it.. If you think an AI is "pretending" or has "intentions" then you are anthropomorphizing it more strongly than people who are emotionally moved by chatting with an AI while knowing that it's a chatbot.
Usually the feel part is the subconscius one that isn't swayed by knowing
Like a phobia, its whole thing is being irrational, knowing it doesn't make sense doesn't diminish the feeling
Don't people realize it's a machine "pretending" to be human?