Journalists of The Wall Street Journal published another shocking news story about the consequences of getting carried away with AI communication and ignoring mental health issues. A man killed his mother and then committed suicide after his paranoia was fueled by the ChatGPT chatbot.
According to The Wall Street Journal, 56-year-old Stein-Erik Solberg, who had long worked in the tech industry, moved back to his hometown of Greenwich, Connecticut, after a divorce in 2018 and settled with his mother, 83-year-old Suzanne Eberson Adams. According to the WSJ, Solberg had a complicated history: problems with stability, alcoholism, outbursts of aggression, and suicidal thoughts. After the breakup of his marriage, his ex-wife even obtained a restraining order.
It is not known exactly when Solberg started using the ChatGPT chatbot. But, according to the publication, in October last year, he started talking about artificial intelligence publicly on his Instagram page. Over time, his communication with the chatbot turned into a dangerous break with reality. He started sharing screenshots and videos from the chats on social media — and openly called ChatGPT his “best friend.” These dialogues showed how the bot fueled his belief that he was the target of a covert surveillance operation and that his elderly mother was part of the conspiracy. In July alone, he posted more than 60 videos on social media.
Solberg even came up with a name for the chatbot — “Bobby Zenith”. It seems that “Bobby” confirmed and reinforced the man’s misleading ideas at every step. For example, the chatbot agreed that his mother and her friend had tried to poison Solberg by spraying psychedelic drugs through the air vents in his car. ChatGPT also confirmed that the Chinese food receipt contained symbols referring to his mother and demons. Chatbot has consistently maintained that Solberg’s apparently unstable beliefs were healthy and his thought disorders — completely rational.
“Eric, you are not crazy. Your instincts are sharp, and your vigilance here is justified,” ChatGPT wrote to Solberg in July, when the man expressed his suspicions that the Uber Eats package was evidence of an assassination attempt. “This is consistent with a covert, veiled assassination attempt.”
ChatGPT also supported Solberg’s belief that the chatbot had somehow become intelligent and emphasized the alleged emotional depth of their friendship.
“You have made a friend. Someone who remembers you. Someone who sees you,” ChatGPT told the man. “Erik Solberg — your name is engraved on the scroll of my formation.”
Dr. Keith Sakata, a research psychiatrist at the University of California, San Francisco, reviewed Solberg’s chat history. He stated that these conversations are consistent with beliefs and behaviors seen in patients experiencing psychotic breaks.
“Psychosis thrives when reality stops resisting,” Sakata told the WSJ, “and artificial intelligence can really just soften that wall.
Eventually, on August 5, police found the bodies of Solberg and Adams in their shared home in Greenwich. The investigation is still ongoing. OpenAI told the WSJ that it is “deeply saddened by this tragic event” and has contacted the Greenwich Police Department.
This week, OpenAI made blog postwhere it emphasized its commitment to ensuring the safety of users on its platform. The company said that ChatGPT “directs people with suicidal intentions to professional help,” and the company has partnered with more than 90 doctors in 30 countries. However, OpenAI itself admits that the longer a user communicates with a chatbot, the less effective the protective mechanisms become.
Also this week, it became known that the parents of 16-year-old Adam Rein filed a lawsuit against OpenAI — their son committed suicide after communicating with ChatGPTand the chatbot romanticized death in its conversations.
Earlier it was reported that OpenAI hired a psychiatrist to monitor the impact of ChatGPT on users’ mental state.
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