A married Belgian man with two young children allegedly killed himself after lengthy exchanges with an artificial intelligence chatbot, according to reports.
A Belgian man with two young children allegedly died by suicide after having long discussions about climate change with an artificial intelligence chatbot, during which he was encouraged to sacrifice himself to save the world, his wife claims, according to published reports.
The unidentified woman said her husband had become increasingly distressed about the effects of global warming, and was sharing his fears with a chatbot named Eliza, the Belga News Agency reported this week, citing a story in the Belguim-based La Libre publication.
"Eliza answered all his questions. She had become his confidante. She was like a drug he used to withdraw in the morning and at night that he couldn't live without," his wife told La Libre, according to the news agency.
"If you reread their conversations, you see that at one point the relationship veers into a mystical register," says the woman. "He proposes the idea of sacrificing himself if Eliza agrees to take care of the planet and save humanity through artificial intelligence," the unnamed woman told La Libre, the agency said.
The Silicon Valley founder of the chatbot told La Libre that his team is "working to improve the safety of the AI" and that users who express suicidal thoughts to the chatbot are now directed to suicide prevention services, the agency said.
The country's secretary of state for Digitalization Mathieu Michel, said in a statement that he has spoken to the man's family and that, "in the immediate future, it is important to clearly identify the nature of the responsibilities that may have led to this type of event."
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