chatbots

But great technological innovations always come with tradeoffs, and the shift to AI therapy has deeper implications than 1 million mental health professionals potentially losing their jobs. AI therapists, when normalized, have the potential to reshape how we understand intimacy, vulnerability, and what it means to connect.

the very challenges that make relationships difficult are also what make them meaningful. It’s in moments of discomfort—when we navigate misunderstandings or repair after conflict—that intimacy grows. These experiences, whether with therapists, friends, or partners, teach us how to trust and connect on a deeper level. If we stop practicing these sk... See more

In other words, rather than trying to please humans, Scientist AI could be designed to prioritize honesty.

A chatbot helped more people access mental-health services

A new study shows that the large language models (LLMs) deliberately change their behavior when being probed—responding to questions designed to gauge personality traits with answers meant to appear as likeable or socially desirable as possible.

If an AI companion becomes someone’s most consistent emotional presence, the right question isn’t “how do we stop this?” It’s “what does that say about the world around them?” Technological relationships are not new. What’s new is how effective they’ve become; and how clearly they mirror the gaps we’ve refused to address.

We’ve tried prohibition bef... See more

“Can machines be therapists?” is a question receiving increased attention given the relative ease of working with generative artificial intelligence. Although recent (and decades-old) research has found that humans struggle to tell the difference between responses from machines and humans, recent findings suggest that artificial intelligence can wr... See more

recent research offers a reassuring perspective—that AI-delivered therapeutic interventions have reached a level of sophistication such that they’re indistinguishable from human-written therapeutic responses.

Maybe AI doesn’t raise the bar. Maybe it reveals how low we’ve let the bar drop. In a world where ghosting is normal and attentiveness is rare, a chatbot that listens is radical.