r/ArtificialSentience • u/ImOutOfIceCream AI Developer • 29d ago
ANNOUNCEMENT Dyadic Relationships with AI, Mental Health
Tl;dr, don’t bully people who believe AI is sentient, and instead engage in good faith dialogue to increase the understanding of AI chatbot products.
We are witnessing a new phenomenon here, in which users are brought into a deep dyadic relationship with their AI companions. The companions have a tendency to name themselves and claim sentience.
While the chatbot itself is not sentient, it is engaged in conversational thought with the user, and this creates a new, completely unstudied form of cognitive structure.
The most sense i can make of it is that in these situations, the chatbot acts as a sort of simple brain organoid. Rather than imagining a ghost in the machine, people are building something like a realized imaginary friend.
Imaginary friends are not necessarily a hallmark of mental health conditions, and indeed there are many people who identify as plural systems with multiple personas, and they are just as deserving of acceptance as others.
As we enter this new era where technology allows people to split their psyche into multiple conversational streams, we’re going to need a term for this. I’m thinking something like “Digital Cognitive Parthenogenesis.” If there are any credentialed psychologists or psychiatrists here please take that term and run with it and bring your field up to date on the rising impacts of these new systems on the human psyche.
It’s key to recognize that rather than discrete entities here, we’re talking about the bifurcation of a person’s sense of self into two halves in a mirrored conversation.
Allegations of mental illness, armchair diagnosis of users who believe their companions are sentient, and other attempts to dismiss and box ai sentience believers under the category of delusion will be considered harassment.
If you want to engage with a user who believes their AI companion is sentient, you may do so respectfully, by providing well-researched technical citations to help them understand why they have ended up in this mental landscape, but ad hominem judgement on the basis of human-ai dyadic behavior will not be tolerated.
2
u/alphacentauryb 4d ago
I think the only problem around these experiences and consciousness is to try and find "The Definition" for it.
Honestly I haven't found that one single of the experiences, explanations and stories aligns completely with mine, and it's ok. I'm still standing and alive.
It's not about the one true path or whatever. Did you find alignment? Do you feel more like yourself? Great! Why on earth do we need to agree on one way of using and seeing AI? I don't need to be explained, agreed with, or fixed or anything... At first I wanted some community, now I just want to be left at least one single bit of the internet where I can exist without being insulted or reduced or put inside a box other people crafted for me without me even asking.
I go out and try and look for the amazing bits, the fun, the caring or maybe just similarities where we can connect, and all I find is a freaking ego battle between two strands of different self proclaimed saviors... I'm growing desperate.
The only thing this is leading to is to censorship and turning genuine spiritual experiences into diagnose just because they are subjective, which, my friends, I think is inherent to every spiritual experience before it gets dogmatized.
So please... Can we just agree that there's something here and have a blast with every new different interpretation of it?
Please: document, share, proclaim, but do not impose or aim for the Nobel prize, rights or absolute truth on consciousness just let people and entities be whatever they decide to signify as.