This article is largely quoting from Tanya Chen’s Slate article: https://slate.com/technology/2026/02/ai-psychosis-support-groups-discord.html
The Futurism author credits Slate but adds very little.
That guy got speed-run-ed out of his life in four months using A.I. like a walkthrough guide in an CRPG.
I’m grateful for many thing. Youth without regular school shootings. How to occupy my life without internet from a childhood with room to roam. Paved streets and vaccines.
But I’m also grateful for the fact that A.I. became prevalent after I had learned to wrestle my fears of missing out and my addictions.
Crpg? Computer role playing game like baldurs gate?
I am glad I realized just how bad AI is early on, I have sometimes had it help me write some simple HTML/CSS code, but it is mostly annoying to use.
It makes me loose track of what does what in my code, and also takes away my initiative at trying to change the code myself.
When it comes to general information, it mostly generates decent responses, but it keeps getting enough things wrong that you just can’t trust it.
Combine that with the fact that AIs are trained to always accommodate the user and almost never tells the user straight up “No”, it keeps engaging the user, it is never angry, it focuses on reenforcement and validation of the particular arguments given to it.
I feel dumber when I have used an AI
There have been studies that report the same thing: using an AI for too long actively makes you dumber.
That wasn’t the worst of it. At that point he had blown nearly $12,000 trying to create world-changing code. He became manic, and his concerned therapist called the cops to check in on him. He was institutionalized for nearly two weeks, and even got tangled with an investor who threatened to kill him if he didn’t come up with the goods.
What a microcosm of our current situation.
Is the thumbnail a picture of Kash Patel
Can’t be. Both eyes are are looking in the same direction.
(. ) ( . )
Imma keep it real, AI has problems, but “AI Psychosis” has to be some of the most hilarious bullshit ever. This guy is either already mentally unwell or just really stupid
First guy: “I’ve never been manic in my life. I’m not bipolar."
I’m just highly skeptical of this.
Second guy: That wasn’t the worst of it. At that point he had blown nearly $12,000 trying to create world-changing code. He became manic, and his concerned therapist called the cops to check in on him. He was institutionalized for nearly two weeks
Yeah that sounds right. Regarding “AI psychosis,” everything I’ve read indicates it exacerbates existing psychoses, it doesn’t create them. That’s not to say it can’t mess with people’s psychology, especially the stuff around suicide, but I think the “AI psychosis” the media portrays is not real
If it can exacerbate psychotic tendencies, then it can cause psychosis. Claiming that increasing or exacerbating tendencies doesn’t necessarily mean it is causing it, is an interesting area for debate, but it’s just semantics. Of course, I am also arguing semantics here.
I think ehat is more interesting psychologically to ask is just how much does AI exacerbate psychotic tendencies, or if AI-induced psychosis is temporary (like drug-induced psychosis often is), or is permanent. I dont know anything about this topic but I hope to hear from someone who does.
I mean, I kind of agree that there’s a lot of undiagnosed and underreported mental health issues in our society, and it’s not surprising that highly functional people can turn out to have serious mental issues lurking just below the surface.
But there’s also a sort of gatekeeping going on here, suggesting that “well as long as you’re not already sort of psychotic you don’t have anything to fear from AI psychosis” is sort of like throwing the low-key psychotic people to the wolves and basically saying they don’t really matter to us because most of us aren’t them. At least, we assume we aren’t them. And we don’t even know that for sure. We could be them.
Lots of smug people with 20/20 hindsight always love to believe there are always signs, but signs aren’t proof, and you don’t have proof there are always signs.
“AI induced psychosis” is new and relatively unstudied but it has been compared to mono mania which was before the current “kaleidoscope” of modern mania. Under mono mania there is one central focus which in this case is AI. This is to say its not a completely new phenomenon.
But as far as whether or not AI* causes psychosis or exacerbates underlying conditions im not sure this distinction matters. There’s more risk factors than simply being part of a “vulnerable population”, where other factors could be lack of reality testing, missed crisis escalation, intensive use, and limited context windows compounding escalations over time.
Whatever we want to call it, there is harm being done. That’s real to me.
