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'It cannot provide nuance': UK experts warn AI therapy chatbots are not safe

(www.theguardian.com)
165 points distalx | 1 comments | 10 May 25 15:35 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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sheepscreek ◴[10 May 25 22:18 UTC] No.43949463[source]▶
That’s fair but there’s another nuance that they can’t solve for. Cost and availability.

AI is not a substitute for traditional therapy, but it offers an 80% benefit at a fraction of the cost. It could be used to supplement therapy, for the periods between sessions.

The biggest risk is with privacy. Meta could not be trusted knowing what you’re going to wear or eat. Now imagine them knowing your deepest darkest secrets. The advertising business model does not gel well with providing mental health support. Subscription (with privacy guarantees) is the way to go.

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1. rsynnott ◴[10 May 25 22:38 UTC] No.43949591[source]▶
> AI is not a substitute for traditional therapy, but it offers an 80% benefit at a fraction of the cost.

That... seems optimistic. See, for instance, https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/ai-spi...

No psychologist will attempt to convince you that you are the messiah. In at least some cases, our robot overlords are doing _serious active harm_ which the subject would be unlikely to suffer in their absence. LLM therapists are rather likely to be worse than nothing, particularly given their tendency to be overly agreeable.