Warning over mental health impact of AI chatbots

The unforeseen impact of chatbots on mental health should be viewed as a "warning" over the existential threat posed by superintelligent artificial intelligence systems, according to a prominent voice in AI safety.

- Dan Milmo

Nate Soares, the co-author of a new book on highly advanced AI titled If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies, said the example of Adam Raine, a US teenager who killed himself after months of conversations with the ChatGPT chatbot, underlined fundamental problems with controlling the technology.

"These AIs, when they're engaging with teenagers in this way that drives them to suicide - that is not a behaviour the creators wanted. That is not a behaviour the creators intended," he said.

He added: "Adam Raine's case illustrates the seed of a problem that would grow catastrophic if these AIs grow smarter."

Soares, a former Google and Microsoft engineer who is now president of the US-based Machine Intelligence Research Institute, warned that humanity would be wiped out if it created artificial superintelligence (ASI), a theoretical state where an AI system is superior to humans at all intellectual tasks. Soares and his co-author, Eliezer Yudkowsky, are among the AI experts warning that such systems would not act in humanity's interests.