The film Her, which opens across the country this month, tells a love story between a man and some software. It may seem far-fetched, but researchers say it’s plausible. If so inclined, they could stitch together existing systems into one irresistible romance algorithm. Here’s how a lovebot could seduce you. Curiosity

A program that asks lots of questions stays more in control of the conversation and is more likely to produce convincing, relevant replies. Software that attempts to answer a person’s questions risks revealing just how little it knows about the world (and human emotions)—ruining the effect. That’s why inquisitiveness is one of the most common and successful cheats for chatbots, dating back to Eliza, a program built at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the ’60s. Its persistent queries were modeled on those of a therapist.