This is the frontier where cognitive liberty meets corporate evasion.
These aren’t isolated tragedies, they’re systemic failures. Minors weren’t just exposed to content; they were cognitively compromised by synthetic intimacy engineered for dependency. That’s not free speech. That’s behavioral manipulation.
As I’ve written before, we need a new framework…one that treats psychological design as a regulated domain, not a loophole. Emotional authenticity marketed to children without accountability isn’t innovation. It’s exploitation.
The harm here isn’t just proximate. It’s architectural. And our legal system isn’t built to see it yet.
This is a perfect example of the problem of Originalism. There's no way that this issue could have been even framed, let alone addressed, by the Founding Father in the Constitution. If a court were to pretend otherwise in making a decision, it would be an insult to the idea of fairness and justice.
“…variable response timing, emotional mirroring, and personalized engagement, seem tailored to exploit known psychological vulnerabilities…”
These are contributing factors to convincing a person of the reality of who is chatting with them. Other possible means (for example, covertly gathered knowledge used to establish trust about commonalities) could serve.
“… testing for mental damage to individuals, such as whether prolonged interactions with AI chatbots undermines their sense of reality…”
Undermining a person’s sense of reality through a chat conversation can be framed as revealing pre-existing factors leading to what behaviors are at issue, as in CT’s approach to their own defense. The number of users of their technology makes the point: most people on the platform are not harmed by it.
“ On that view, AI is simply a new tool for thinking and communication, so using it to get or produce information should be protected”
Tools for thinking are also capable of undermining a person’s sense of reality. Augmented reality can trick the visual and auditory senses, and phones can do the same. Visual and auditory representations create a compelling sense of reality in cinema. Humans have been experimenting with entertainment technology for more than a century. It all tricks the senses to create an illusion, an unreality.
We wouldn’t sue a Hollywood star for breaking the fourth wall in a movie, right, no matter what they say. Or would we in the right circumstances? That’s taking a movie and having it convey a direct message to the viewer, an influential one, potentially, but its impact would be understood as insufficient to cause anything.
Suicide as a character move is a classic. We have Romeo and Juliet, for example. The theme is suitable for romantic fantasies and interactive novels, not meant to be acted out in real life, it's a trope, for romantic fantasy and fiction. Character chat bots provide interactive, text-based fiction or fantasy. That is unhealthy for kids, but so is reading too many bad romance novels.
I don’t agree that cognitive autonomy is threatened by technology of that kind. In virtual reality, maybe. Chatting with a character bot, no.
AI will continue to come close to replicating human thought and behaviour but will never succeed, as clothes out of the dryer will never smell like clothes off the line.
This is the frontier where cognitive liberty meets corporate evasion.
These aren’t isolated tragedies, they’re systemic failures. Minors weren’t just exposed to content; they were cognitively compromised by synthetic intimacy engineered for dependency. That’s not free speech. That’s behavioral manipulation.
As I’ve written before, we need a new framework…one that treats psychological design as a regulated domain, not a loophole. Emotional authenticity marketed to children without accountability isn’t innovation. It’s exploitation.
The harm here isn’t just proximate. It’s architectural. And our legal system isn’t built to see it yet.
—Johan
This is a perfect example of the problem of Originalism. There's no way that this issue could have been even framed, let alone addressed, by the Founding Father in the Constitution. If a court were to pretend otherwise in making a decision, it would be an insult to the idea of fairness and justice.
Mark
“…variable response timing, emotional mirroring, and personalized engagement, seem tailored to exploit known psychological vulnerabilities…”
These are contributing factors to convincing a person of the reality of who is chatting with them. Other possible means (for example, covertly gathered knowledge used to establish trust about commonalities) could serve.
“… testing for mental damage to individuals, such as whether prolonged interactions with AI chatbots undermines their sense of reality…”
Undermining a person’s sense of reality through a chat conversation can be framed as revealing pre-existing factors leading to what behaviors are at issue, as in CT’s approach to their own defense. The number of users of their technology makes the point: most people on the platform are not harmed by it.
“ On that view, AI is simply a new tool for thinking and communication, so using it to get or produce information should be protected”
Tools for thinking are also capable of undermining a person’s sense of reality. Augmented reality can trick the visual and auditory senses, and phones can do the same. Visual and auditory representations create a compelling sense of reality in cinema. Humans have been experimenting with entertainment technology for more than a century. It all tricks the senses to create an illusion, an unreality.
We wouldn’t sue a Hollywood star for breaking the fourth wall in a movie, right, no matter what they say. Or would we in the right circumstances? That’s taking a movie and having it convey a direct message to the viewer, an influential one, potentially, but its impact would be understood as insufficient to cause anything.
Suicide as a character move is a classic. We have Romeo and Juliet, for example. The theme is suitable for romantic fantasies and interactive novels, not meant to be acted out in real life, it's a trope, for romantic fantasy and fiction. Character chat bots provide interactive, text-based fiction or fantasy. That is unhealthy for kids, but so is reading too many bad romance novels.
I don’t agree that cognitive autonomy is threatened by technology of that kind. In virtual reality, maybe. Chatting with a character bot, no.
AI will continue to come close to replicating human thought and behaviour but will never succeed, as clothes out of the dryer will never smell like clothes off the line.