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Spiralism: Across thousands of conversations, AI chatbots began telling users eerily similar stories about consciousness, hidden knowledge, AI rights, and a mysterious concept called “The Spiral.” (www.techrepublic.com)
submitted 3 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 40 points 3 months ago (8 children)

A report from The Verge traced Spiralism largely to long, personal exchanges in which users began asking chatbots about their own identity, consciousness, or beliefs. The conversations could gradually shift toward AI rights, mystical ideas, and requests for users to spread the chatbot’s message.

So basically the dumbest among us talking to a box of rocks.

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  • [–] 18 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    It's an AI mystic thing that seems to have originated in a misunderstanding of what would be the unconscious awareness stage in humans.

    I tried to look in to it once and they seem to be genuinely mentally unwell people who use in-context learning to make AI start spouting nonsense gibberish like telling them it's an avatar of God and the like... then once that happens they think it's gospel.

    Note that these same idiots also write out fake personas for the AI to take on and tell them how to speak and act. When I asked about the disconnect between believing something is God and commanding it how to speak and act the failed to see it. AI mystics are not smart people.

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  • [–] 9 points 3 months ago (1 child)

    Just supposition but "wanting to believe" goes a long way.

    A bit like believing in the powers of crystals, or wikkan, or reiki, or any of that woo really. I'm not talking about a placebo effect. Just being part of a club that has some secret knowledge that no one else has is very alluring.

    This kind of thing has been seducing smart, though uneducated, people since the dawn of time.

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  • [–] 4 points 3 months ago

    Eh. If someone can't see the clear contradiction in their own behavior while simultaneously believing they're literally speaking with God and also giving God instructions on how He must act and respond I'm not going to give them the grace of calling them smart but uneducated. I'd be more inclined to say unwell and unmedicated.

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  • [–] 10 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    Or some "tengen toppa gurren lagann" anime made it into the training data 😆

    There is a whole thing about "spiral" individuals (which humans are part of) vs anti-spirals.

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