And that's not all. As we've continued reporting, we've heard numerous troubling stories about people's loved ones being involuntarily committed to psychiatric care facilities — or even ending up in jail — after becoming fixated on the bot.
"I was just like, I don't f*cking know what to do," one woman told us. "Nobody knows who knows what to do."
Her husband, she said, had no prior history of mania, delusion, or psychosis. He'd turned to ChatGPT about 12 weeks ago for assistance with a permaculture and construction project; soon, after engaging the bot in probing philosophical chats, he became engulfed in messianic delusions, proclaiming that he had somehow brought forth a sentient AI, and that with it he had "broken" math and physics, embarking on a grandiose mission to save the world. His gentle personality faded as his obsession deepened, and his behavior became so erratic that he was let go from his job. He stopped sleeping and rapidly lost weight.
"He was like, 'just talk to [ChatGPT]. You'll see what I'm talking about,'" his wife recalled. "And every time I'm looking at what's going on the screen, it just sounds like a bunch of affirming, sycophantic bullsh*t."
Eventually, the husband slid into a full-tilt break with reality. Realizing how bad things had become, his wife and a friend went out to buy enough gas to make it to the hospital. When they returned, the husband had a length of rope wrapped around his neck.
The friend called emergency medical services, who arrived and transported him to the emergency room. From there, he was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric care facility.
It sounds almost like something out of science-fiction. But it's happening. Thankfully it hasn't struck me. Maybe one reason is because as remarkable as artificial intelligence comes across as being, I'm really not all that impressed with it. Strip away all the shiny veneer and AI isn't much else but advanced mathematical set theory with a language emulator welded on. Granted, it also has an enormous base of data to draw from, but proportionally not much more than has been made available to the average Internet user for more than thirty years now.
I use ChatGPAT every so often. It can be a terrific tool, if used responsibly (and generating "art" depicting General Robert E. Lee dueling with a Predator probably isn't that). When it comes to research it can be a solid instrument. However do bear in mind, I do not and never will use it to "write" for me though! Unless it's explicitly stated that it's generated by an AI, pretty much everything you read or see on The Knight Shift - apart from cited articles like in this post and the like - comes from my own mind and whatever hands-on skills and creativity I have been endowed with. If only many others would have more confidence in their own minds and know that they are loved and appreciated in ways that no computer, regardless of how advanced, can possibly possess.
Maybe I should consider getting back into the mental health field. It seems that there may be a burgeoning "market" soon for technology professionals who also have expertise in psychiatric health.
Since I mentioned it, here indeed is a rendering of Robert E. Lee fighting a Predator, generated by ChatGPT. I'm not all that impressed with this either, to be honest. Lee looks way off. It's a pretty spot-on Predator though...
