Trapped in a ChatGPT Spiral

Sep 16, 2025 · 47 min · 45.5 MBExplicit

0:00-47:22

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Warning: This episode discusses suicide.

Since ChatGPT began in 2022, it has amassed 700 million users, making it the fastest-growing consumer app ever. Reporting has shown that the chatbots have a tendency to endorse conspiratorial and mystical belief systems. For some people, conversations with the technology can deeply distort their reality.

Kashmir Hill, who covers technology and privacy for The New York Times, discusses how complicated and dangerous our relationships with chatbots can become.

Guest: Kashmir Hill, a feature writer on the business desk at The New York Times who covers technology and privacy.

Background reading:

Here’s how chatbots can go into a delusional spiral.
These people asked an A.I. chatbot questions. The answers distorted their views of reality.
A teenager was suicidal, and ChatGPT was the friend he confided in.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Photo: The New York Times

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