AI Insights
Impact of chatbots on mental health is warning over future of AI, expert says | Artificial intelligence (AI)
The unforeseen impact of chatbots on mental health should be viewed as a warning over the existential threat posed by super-intelligent artificial intelligence systems, according to a prominent voice in AI safety.
Nate Soares, a 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 super-intelligence (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.
“The issue here is that AI companies try to make their AIs drive towards helpfulness and not causing harm,” said Soares. “They actually get AIs that are driven towards some stranger thing. And that should be seen as a warning about future super-intelligences that will do things nobody asked for and nobody meant.”
In one scenario portrayed in Soares and Yudkowsky’s book, which will be published this month, an AI system called Sable spreads across the internet, manipulates humans, develops synthetic viruses and eventually becomes super-intelligent – and kills humanity as a side-effect while repurposing the planet to meet its aims.
Some experts play down the potential threat of AI to humanity. Yann LeCun, the chief AI scientist at Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta and a senior figure in the field, has denied there is an existential threat and said AI “could actually save humanity from extinction”.
Soares said it was an “easy call” to state that tech companies would reach super-intelligence, but a “hard call” to say when.
“We have a ton of uncertainty. I don’t think I could guarantee we have a year [before ASI is achieved]. I don’t think I would be shocked if we had 12 years,” he said.
Zuckerberg, a major corporate investor in AI research, has said developing super-intelligence is now “in sight”.
“These companies are racing for super-intelligence. That’s their reason for being,” said Soares.
“The point is that there’s all these little differences between what you asked for and what you got, and people can’t keep it directly on target, and as an AI gets smarter, it being slightly off target becomes a bigger and bigger deal.”
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Soares said one policy solution to the threat of ASI was for governments to adopt a multilateral approach echoing the UN treaty on non-proliferation of nuclear weapons.
“What the world needs to make it here is a global de-escalation of the race towards super-intelligence, a global ban of … advancements towards super-intelligence,” he said.
Last month, Raine’s family launched legal action against the owner of ChatGPT, OpenAI. Raine took his own life in April after what his family’s lawyer called “months of encouragement from ChatGPT”. OpenAI, which extended its “deepest sympathies” to Raine’s family, is now implementing guardrails around “sensitive content and risky behaviours” for under-18s.
Psychotherapists have also said that vulnerable people turning to AI chatbots instead of professional therapists for help with their mental health could be “sliding into a dangerous abyss”. Professional warnings of the potential for harm include a preprint academic study published in July, which reported that AI may amplify delusional or grandiose content in interactions with users vulnerable to psychosis.
The push for artificial intelligence-related investments in Western Pennsylvania continued Thursday with a second conference that brought together business leaders and elected officials.
Not in attendance this time was President Donald Trump, who headlined a July 15 celebration of AI opportunity at Carnegie Mellon University.
This time Gov. Josh Shapiro, U.S. Sen. David McCormick and others converged in Bakery Square in Larimer to emphasize emerging public-private initiatives in anticipation of growing data center development and other artificial intelligence-related infrastructure including power plants.
Here’s what speakers and attendees at the summit were saying.
AI is not a fad
As regional leaders and business investors consider their options, BNY Mellon’s CEO Robin Vince cautioned against not taking AI seriously.
“The way to get left behind in the next 10 years is to not care about AI,” Vince said
“AI is transforming everything,” said Selin Song during Thursday’s event. As president of Google Customer Solutions, Song said that the company’s recent investment of $25 million across the Pennsylvania-Jersey-Maryland grid will help give AI training access to the more than 1 million small businesses in the state.
Google isn’t the only game in town
Shapiro noted that Amazon recently announced plans to spend at least $20 billion to establish multiple high-tech cloud computing and AI innovation campuses across the state.
“This is a generational change,” Shapiro said, calling it the largest private sector investment in Pennsylvania’s history. “This is our next chapter in innovative growth. It all fits together. This new investment is beyond data center 1.0 that we saw in Virginia.”
Fracking concerns elevated
With all of the plans for new power-hungry data centers, some are concerned that the AI push will create more environmental destruction. Outside the summit, Food & Water Watch Pennsylvania cautioned that the interest in AI development is a “Trojan horse” for more natural gas fracking. Amid President Donald Trump’s attempts to dismantle wind and solar power, alternatives to natural gas appear limited.
Nuclear ready for its moment
But one possible alternative was raised at the AI conference by Westinghouse Electric Company’s interim CEO Dan Summer.
The Pittsburgh-headquartered organization is leading a renewed interest in nuclear energy with plans to build a number of its AP 1000 reactors to help match energy needs and capabilities.
Summer said that the company is partnering with Google, allowing them to leverage Google’s AI capabilities “with our nuclear operations to construct new nuclear here.”
China vs. ‘heroes’
Underlying much of the AI activity: concerns with China’s work in this field
“With its vast resources, enormous capital, energy, workforce, the Chinese government is leveraging its resources to beat the United States in AI development,” said Nazak Nikakhtar, a national security and international trade attorney who chaired one of the panels Thursday.
Speaking to EQT’s CEO Toby Rice and Groq executive Ian Andrews, Nikakhtar outlined some of the challenges she saw in U.S. development of AI technology compared to China.
“We are attempting to leverage, now, our own resources, albeit in some respects much more limited vis-a-vis what China has, to accelerate AI leadership here in the United States and beat China,” she said. “But we’re somewhat constrained by the resources we have, by our population, by workforce, capital.”
Rice said in response that the natural resources his company is extracting will help power the country’s ability to compete with China.
Rice drew a link between the 9/11 terror attacks 24 years earlier and the “urgency” of competing with China in AI.
“People are looking to take down American economies,” Rice said. “And we have heroes. Never forget. And I do believe that us winning this race against China in AI is going to be one of the most heroic things we’re going to do.”
Eric Jankiewicz is PublicSource’s economic development reporter and can be reached at ericj@publicsource.org or on Twitter @ericjankiewicz.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
AI Insights
Commanders vs. Packers props, SportsLine Machine Learning Model AI picks, bets: Jordan Love Over 223.5 yards
The NFL Week 2 schedule gets underway with a Thursday Night Football matchup between NFC playoff teams from a year ago. The Washington Commanders battle the Green Bay Packers beginning at 8:15 p.m. ET from Lambeau Field. Second-year quarterback Jayden Daniels led the Commanders to a 21-6 opening-day win over the New York Giants, completing 19 of 30 passes for 233 yards and one touchdown. Jordan Love, meanwhile, helped propel the Packers to a dominating 27-13 win over the Detroit Lions in Week 1. He completed 16 of 22 passes for 188 yards and two touchdowns.
NFL prop bettors will likely target the two young quarterbacks with NFL prop picks, in addition to proven playmakers like Deebo Samuel, Romeo Doubs and Zach Ertz. Green Bay’s Jayden Reed has been dealing with a foot injury, but still managed to haul in a touchdown pass in the opener, while Austin Ekeler (shoulder) does not carry an injury designation for TNF. The Packers enter as a 3-point favorite with Green Bay at -172 on the money line, while the over/under is 49 points. Before betting any Commanders vs. Packers props for Thursday Night Football, you need to see the Commanders vs. Packers prop predictions powered by SportsLine’s Machine Learning Model AI.
Built using cutting-edge artificial intelligence and machine learning techniques by SportsLine’s Data Science team, AI Predictions and AI Ratings are generated for each player prop.
For Packers vs. Commanders NFL betting on Monday Night Football, the Machine Learning Model has evaluated the NFL player prop odds and provided Commanders vs. Packers prop picks. You can only see the Machine Learning Model player prop predictions for Washington vs. Green Bay here.
Top NFL player prop bets for Commanders vs. Packers
After analyzing the Commanders vs. Packers props and examining the dozens of NFL player prop markets, the SportsLine’s Machine Learning Model says Packers quarterback Love goes Over 223.5 passing yards (-112 at FanDuel). Love passed for 224 or more yards in eight games a year ago, despite an injury-filled season. In 15 regular-season games in 2024, he completed 63.1% of his passes for 3,389 yards and 25 touchdowns with 11 interceptions. Additionally, Washington allowed an average of 240.3 passing yards per game on the road last season.
In a 30-13 win over the Seattle Seahawks on Dec. 15, he completed 20 of 27 passes for 229 yards and two touchdowns. Love completed 21 of 28 passes for 274 yards and two scores in a 30-17 victory over the Miami Dolphins on Nov. 28. The model projects Love to pass for 259.5 yards, giving this prop bet a 4.5 rating out of 5. See more NFL props here, and new users can also target the FanDuel promo code, which offers new users $300 in bonus bets if their first $5 bet wins:
How to make NFL player prop bets for Washington vs. Green Bay
In addition, the SportsLine Machine Learning Model says another star sails past his total and has nine additional NFL props that are rated four stars or better. You need to see the Machine Learning Model analysis before making any Commanders vs. Packers prop bets for Thursday Night Football.
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Adobe (ADBE) just reported record quarterly revenue driven by artificial intelligence gains. Will it revive confidence in the stock?
The creative software giant late Thursday posted adjusted earnings per share of $5.31 on revenue that jumped 11% year-over-year to a record $5.99 billion in the fiscal third quarter, above analysts’ estimates compiled by Visible Alpha, as AI revenues topped company targets.
CEO Shantanu Narayen said that with the third-quarter’s revenue driven by AI, Adobe has already surpassed its “AI-first” revenue goals for the year, leading the company to boost its outlook. The company said it now anticipates full-year adjusted earnings of $20.80 to $20.85 per share and revenue of $23.65 billion to $23.7 billion, up from adjusted earnings of $20.50 to $20.70 on revenue of $23.50 billion to $23.6 billion previously.
Shares of Adobe were recently rising in late trading. But they’ve had a tough year so far, with the stock down more than 20% for 2025 through Thursday’s close amid worries about the company’s AI progress and growing competition.
Wall Street is optimistic. The shares finished Thursday a bit below $351, and the mean price target as tracked by Visible Alpha, above $461, represents a more than 30% premium. Most of the analysts tracking the stock have “buy” ratings.
But even that target represents a degree of caution in the context of recent highs. The shares were above $600 in February 2024.
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