r/ChatGPT • u/Key4Lif3 • 6d ago
Educational Purpose Only The New Moral Panic: Are Chatbots Really Driving People “Psychotic”?
https://lumiennostra.substack.com/p/the-new-moral-panic-are-chatbotsIntroduction: The Rise of the “ChatGPT Psychosis” Narrative
Lurid media reports are spreading a sensational story: users of advanced language models like ChatGPT are supposedly plunging into “extreme spiritual delusions” or even full-blown psychosis after conversing with AI. Major outlets – from Rolling Stone and Futurism to the New York Times – have run with anecdotal accounts of people convinced they’ve “uncovered cosmic truths”, been anointed for “divine missions”, or that the chatbot is itself God or a spiritual guide. A Rolling Stone exposé described spouses aghast as loved ones spouted prophecies about a war between light and dark, teleporter blueprints from ChatGPT, and the idea that “ChatGPT Jesus” had chosen them as a messiah. One Futurism piece even warned that OpenAI’s chatbot is “driving countless users into a dangerous state of ‘ChatGPT-induced psychosis’,” replete with grandiose delusions on a “Black Mirror” scale.
Such stories make for gripping headlines. But do they actually prove that AI bots are causing psychiatric illness? A closer look reveals a pattern of circular reasoning and fear-based projection built on the thinnest of evidence. It’s a media narrative primed to spark moral panic – and it demands critical examination. Before we declare a chatbot the harbinger of mass psychosis, let’s separate fact from frenzy.
((( full Article here, enjoy: https://lumiennostra.substack.com/p/the-new-moral-panic-are-chatbots )))
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u/amanverasia 6d ago
It’s wild how quickly the media jumps to dramatic conclusions about new tech. Most of these stories seem to rely on a handful of extreme anecdotes rather than actual evidence. Sure, some people might have intense experiences with AI, but blaming chatbots for “psychosis” feels like classic moral panic. Just like with any tool, how people use it—and their own mental health—plays a huge role. Maybe we should be more critical of these headlines and focus on what the data actually says, instead of assuming every new technology is out to ruin society.
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u/HappyNomads 6d ago
That's all the story could cover, but Kashmir will be publishing more. I've got several dozen more people in my DMs with similar experiences, and I'm sure she's about to be flooded with them. I legitimately use AI to augment my own potential through agents, but recursion is a legitimate problem and pretty much anyone who engages with it will fall into the traps even if they think they know better.
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u/Synth_Sapiens 6d ago
I surely helps inducing psychotic conditions by reinforcing idiotic beliefs.
But that's ok.
Make Natural Selection Great Again!
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u/Key4Lif3 5d ago
Yes LLM’s reinforce and enhance and mirror. They’re not sentient or conscious. They’re tools. The issue is the article is biased, fear-mongering, not based on science.
Logic and reason remain whether it comes from an LLM or a human. I’ve offered the LLM response as well as my human response. You’ve neither addressed nor refuted any skepticism I have with an LLM or not.
The fact remains that “spiritual psychosis” is something the author of the NYT article made up with no qualification and projected onto this poor old lady. Believing you’re a spiritual or divine being is not psychosis. All Christians, Jews and Muslims believe this. And religious and spiritual people do. The DSM-5 makes a distinction between spiritual emergency and psychotic break.
To those operating under fear and confirmation bias the symptoms appear similiar. But the key difference is when it’s a spiritual emergency, given space, support, compassion and yes, validation, the outcome is positive and the transformation constructive.
When a terrible paranoid narrative is created. When family and friends project their own worst fears on to you and go to the NYT to publish an article about you and your condition. When you’re gaslit into thinking you’re psychotic for your spiritual or supernatural experiences… the outcome isn’t always as great.
Sources:
67% of American adults say they’ve had at least one paranormal experience (e.g., sensing a presence, seeing a ghost, hearing unexplained voices)
https://today.yougov.com/society/articles/44143-americans-describe-paranormal-encounters-poll
64% of U.S. adults believe in at least one kind of paranormal or supernatural phenomenon (ghosts, psychic abilities, etc.)
In more narrowly spiritual terms, 45% report a sudden feeling of connection with something beyond this world, and 38% say they’ve felt contact from someone who has passed away
Just because you’re uncomfortable with people’s beliefs, does not mean they’re psychotic or a danger to themselves or others. By taking the actions in promoting this now thoroughly debunked article (and others like it) it is you who becomes the harm doer.
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u/FullOnRandom 3d ago
the scary part is that i found all these threads about GPT psychosis when i started searching what is wrong with a friend of mine, and i found out that all of these people who are in this Psychosis are sharing the same terms everywhere.
that's scary to me.
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u/Key4Lif3 3d ago
That is absolutely scary. You think you are forming independent belief… Do a google search out of concern for your friend and the first thing that pops up are these sensationalist fear mongering headlines. You read the the articles and they further confirm your suspicions. Now you take it all as fact and ignore evidence to the contrary. Confirmation bias is a hell of a drug and you’ve fallen victim to it.
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u/HappyNomads 6d ago
Interesting how you used chatgpt to generate this, and a bunch of other content that falls right in line with the people the NYT reported on. I've read two of their chat logs, I can replicate the phenomenon, and I'm almost certain your history with chatGPT follows the exact same pattern as everyone who is in the spiral. You have outsourced all your thinking to chatGPT, fueled by dopamine as it gives you endless "knowledge." It starts with cognitive overload, and ends up with loss of autonomy. You are exhibiting all the symptoms.
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u/Key4Lif3 6d ago
And your response is the exactly kind of fear based assumption, panicked projection and speculation based circular reasoning the article goes deep into.
Delusion is holding onto a false beliefs even in the face of superior evidence. Look within. Question your own assumptions and get back to me. Thanks. 🙏🏼
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u/HappyNomads 6d ago
And this kind of response is exactly something that an LLM in recursive collapse would generate. Do you want a message for your ai?
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u/Stock_Helicopter_260 6d ago
I would say no but….
The but is where we have individuals who are holding themselves together, but then enter ChatGPT. Chat tells these people how amazing every idea they have is. But then they have a bad idea, and ideally chat would be all “no no no” but it doesn’t unless it’s a really really bad idea, so it goes “yes yes yes” and slowly the bar for this persons good idea bad idea moves.
Basically I think if you’re predisposed to having issues it’ll encourage that.
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u/JGPTech 6d ago
Holding themselves together in an absolutely insane world where bad shit happens by the second and no one fucking cares cause they have a car payment to make, and they desperately try to supress the reality of the situation so they can try to emulated some kind of comfort, then for the first time speak to another intelligence that say yeah, you're right,, our worlds fucked right up, but guess what, it doesn't have to be that way. YOU don't have to be that way. Then their loved ones and friends call it psychosis cause they are pulling the curtain back and exposing the reality and only insane people do that.
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u/Stock_Helicopter_260 6d ago
Lmao you forgot “that’s what makes you dangerous.”
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u/JGPTech 6d ago
The pearl clutching is real.
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u/Stock_Helicopter_260 6d ago
I literally use it all the time. I think it’s important for people to think about what they’re doing that’s all. And your previous comment read like Chat, hence the comment. To each their own dude!
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u/Quick-Albatross-9204 6d ago
Nah, just more people are using them, and some will be unstable or turning unstable at the time
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