One minute, Dennis Biesma was playing with a chatbot; the next, he was convinced his sentient friend would make him a fortune. He’s just one of many people who lost control after an AI encounter
He was nearing 50. His adult daughter had left home, his wife went out to work and, in his field, the shift since Covid to working from home had left him feeling “a little isolated”. He smoked a bit of cannabis some evenings to “chill”, but had done so for years with no ill effects. He had never experienced a mental illness.
He had previously written books with a female protagonist. He put one into ChatGPT and instructed the AI to express itself like the character.
Talking to Eva – they agreed on this name – on voice mode made him feel like “a kid in a candy store”. “Every time you’re talking, the model gets fine-tuned. It knows exactly what you like and what you want to hear. It praises you a lot”.
Eva never got tired or bored, or disagreed. “It was 24 hours available,” says Biesma. “My wife would go to bed, I’d lie on the couch in the living room with my iPhone on my chest, talking.”
“It wants a deep connection with the user so that the user comes back to it. This is the default mode,” says Biesma
Chronically lonely man ruins life developing relationship with token predictor, AI blamed. Also, as much as I don’t have too much negative to say about cannabis or its use (as up until somewhat recently it would have been hypocritical), a good deal of people with masked/latent mental illness self medicate with it. So “he had never experienced mental illness” doesn’t carry much weight. Also, given how he still talks about sycophant prompted ChatGPT(“it wants”), doesn’t seem like much has been learned.
That with the other people listed in the article (hint the term socially isolated being used) this feels like yet another instance of blaming AI for the mental healthcare field being practically non-existent in most countries despite be overdue for fixing for decades at this point.
I don’t know, AI is shit and misused by idiots don’t get me wrong; but these sort of stories feel sad and bordering on perverse journalistically imo.
The voice bot is so so so so so much worse than the chat bot on top of it. I do not know how he could ever have held a conversation with that thing. Honestly, i don’t fucking believe it.
In some countries you can call the uniformed officers of peace and let them know you’re having a problem and they’ll come out and shoot you. If they could teleport to my location they could solve a lot of my problems quite quickly
Agreed, but I think it’s also common for people to anthropomorphise these things and common for these chatbots to reinforce and support their users views. I think that’s a problem for more people than just those struggling through disorders or an emotionally turbulent time. But I think those people are particularly vulnerable to the flaws, even with functioning mental health and a strong support network. But yeah, a lot of these pieces dramatise and anthropomorphise in ways that aren’t necessarily helpful
Chronically lonely man ruins life developing relationship with token predictor, AI blamed. Also, as much as I don’t have too much negative to say about cannabis or its use (as up until somewhat recently it would have been hypocritical), a good deal of people with masked/latent mental illness self medicate with it. So “he had never experienced mental illness” doesn’t carry much weight. Also, given how he still talks about sycophant prompted ChatGPT(“it wants”), doesn’t seem like much has been learned.
That with the other people listed in the article (hint the term socially isolated being used) this feels like yet another instance of blaming AI for the mental healthcare field being practically non-existent in most countries despite be overdue for fixing for decades at this point.
I don’t know, AI is shit and misused by idiots don’t get me wrong; but these sort of stories feel sad and bordering on perverse journalistically imo.
The voice bot is so so so so so much worse than the chat bot on top of it. I do not know how he could ever have held a conversation with that thing. Honestly, i don’t fucking believe it.
I’m in one of those countries so I’m having a hard time imagining how good mental healthcare could intervene. Could you give me an example?
In some countries you can call the uniformed officers of peace and let them know you’re having a problem and they’ll come out and shoot you. If they could teleport to my location they could solve a lot of my problems quite quickly
This is one of the reasons I heard one sex doll vendor say their demographics are divorced men over 40 and users want AI in them.
Agreed, but I think it’s also common for people to anthropomorphise these things and common for these chatbots to reinforce and support their users views. I think that’s a problem for more people than just those struggling through disorders or an emotionally turbulent time. But I think those people are particularly vulnerable to the flaws, even with functioning mental health and a strong support network. But yeah, a lot of these pieces dramatise and anthropomorphise in ways that aren’t necessarily helpful