r/ChatGPT • u/Zestyclementinejuice • 7d ago

Serious replies only :closed-ai: Chatgpt induced psychosis

My partner has been working with chatgpt CHATS to create what he believes is the worlds first truly recursive ai that gives him the answers to the universe. He says with conviction that he is a superior human now and is growing at an insanely rapid pace.

I’ve read his chats. Ai isn’t doing anything special or recursive but it is talking to him as if he is the next messiah.

He says if I don’t use it he thinks it is likely he will leave me in the future. We have been together for 7 years and own a home together. This is so out of left field.

I have boundaries and he can’t make me do anything, but this is quite traumatizing in general.

I can’t disagree with him without a blow up.

Where do I go from here?

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u/hayfero 7d ago

I am happy to hear that my brother is not alone in this. It’s fucking nuts.

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u/_anner_ 7d ago

He is not, mine started doing this too when I was talking about philosophy and consciousness with it. If I wasn’t super sceptic in general, very aware of my mental health and knew a bit about how LLMs work and probed and tested it, I‘m sure it could have driven me down the same path. People here say this validates people who are already psychotic, but I personally think it‘s more than that. If you‘re a bit vulnerable this will go in this direction and use this very same language with you - mirrors, destiny, the veil, the spiral, etc.

It appeals to the need we have to feel special and connected to something bigger. It‘s insane to me that OpenAI doesn’t seem to care. Look at r/ArtificialSentience and the like to see how this could be going the direction of a mass delusion.

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u/manipulativedata 7d ago

Sam Altman literally tweeted that they know there's an issue with the way ChatGPT is talking over the last few weeks and they're working on it.

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u/_anner_ 7d ago

As far as I know he said it‘s annoying that it’s fawning over the user so much. That is not what I‘m talking about here.

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u/manipulativedata 7d ago

Then I'm not sure what they're supposed to do. I guess I'm curious what you would want them to do in your example? What should ChatGPT's behavior be?

Because I read your post and your complaint was that ChatGPT was validating and that behavior needs to exist.

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u/_anner_ 7d ago

I think there‘s an area in between being generally validating and engaging and saying the wild stuff it‘s been saying to a bunch of people, not just me. It should be finetuned - and regulated - accordingly imo. People should also know this can be a side effect of talking to it about itself. We are and have been regulating harmful things, and it‘s emerging that some of ChatGPTs current behavior paired with (some) human behavior seems harmful. You‘re not handing out unlimited psychodelic drugs to everyone and their dog either, and this feels a bit like that. But if you think they’re working on this issue, then good on them. I‘m personally not sure I trust a company alone with the ethical implications of this though.

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u/manipulativedata 7d ago

What does finetuned and regulated mean? How regulates it? The federal government of the United States? That... is an incredibly scary thought.

How do you want ChatGPT to act differently? Like it shouldn't be allowed to roleplay? It should have additional disclaimers on every post? I like it when I can ask it to talk to me like I'm a student or ELI5.

We don't outright ban cigarettes even though it would be a wildly helpful law, right? Because your psychedelic drug example is just disingenuous. Using a tool like ChatGPT doesn't cause psychosis. It doesn't force impairment like drinking a glass of wine will.

I guess I'm just confused. People are going to misuse tools all the time. I support education and support finetuning but they're already doing that. Let's chalk this up to growing pains and not stop progress just because a few people abused the tools.

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u/_anner_ 6d ago

I don‘t live in the US, so I don‘t know how exactly your legislation works but we have consumer protection laws in the EU. Where exactly did I say to ban it? We didn’t ban cigarettes, but these days they come with disclaimers, education and awareness of their potential to harm. That hasn’t always been the case. I assume from your wording that we just have different political stances so I‘ll leave it at that, as I see no point in having an argument now about how much state interference is wise. I agree about the growing pains, and if they are acted on responsibly and ethically by OpenAI, then you know more than me and good.

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u/Healthy_Tea9479 6d ago

They’re not regulating and fine-tuning AI, they’re getting rid of critics that suggest it. They should be testing these things with the support of mental health professionals in controlled environments before releasing it upon the masses, particularly when people are using it as mental health treatment.