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A teen was suicidal. ChatGPT was the friend he confided in

(www.nytimes.com)
443 points jaredwiener | 1 comments | 26 Aug 25 14:15 UTC | HN request time: 0.205s | source
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nis0s ◴[26 Aug 25 21:02 UTC] No.45032298[source]▶
Why did developers spread the idea of AI consciousness for LLMs in the first place? The usefulness and capability of an LLM is orthogonal to its capacity to develop consciousness.

I think people would use LLMs with more detachment if they didn’t believe there was something like a person in them, but they would still become reliant on them, regardless, like people did on calculators for math.

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1. elliotto ◴[27 Aug 25 08:03 UTC] No.45036748[source]▶
As part of my role I watch a lot of people use LLMs and it's fascinating to see their different mental models for what the LLM can do. I suspect it's far easier to explore functionality with a chirpy assistant than an emotionless bot.

I suspect history will remember this as a huge and dangerous mistake, and we will transition to an era of stoic question answering bots that push back harder