Can an AI Chatbot Ever ‘Get’ a Joke?

 “A prevalent malady of our age is to think of the mind as a computer” – Professor Sir Anthony Kenny.

The late science editor of the Daily Telegraph, Adrian Berry, used to get a laugh by telling the following apocryphal anecdote.

An AI is asked to write a short story with the popular themes of religion, aristocracy, mystery and sex:

“Good Lord!” screamed the Duchess, “I’m pregnant! Whodunnit!?”

First time I heard this I was working on my PhD on the metaphysics of consciousness and the viability of conscious machines. I wondered at the time if the hypothetical silicon wordsmith would understand why she’d been so inadvertently and very mildly amusing.

Can a machine, even in principle, ever get a joke? Not tell one, for clearly it can do that, but get one?

Jokes have not been taken seriously enough by the philosophers. Neither have the deeper essences of amusement, humour and laughter more generally, come to that. There is an entanglement of distinctive concepts to be tidied up there and it’s strange that we haven’t had more fun doing just that – conceptual housekeeping being very much our thing....<<<Read More>>>....

Physical ChatGPT robots and people: how we will live together

 Artificial intelligence (AI) is not only a feature of computers and smartphones, but also of physical robots that can sense, act and interact with the world around them.

These robots, known as Physical AI, are designed to look and behave like humans or other animals, and to possess intellectual capabilities normally associated with biological organisms. In this article, we will explore the current state and future prospects of Physical AI, and how it could affect our lives in various domains....<<<Read More>>>...

Are We Teaching AI, or is AI Teaching Us? The Dangerous Feedback Loop Ahead

 Artificial intelligence started as a system trained by human beings. Our writing supplied the raw material, people labelled and ranked outputs, human feedback shaped model behaviour, and real users corrected the machine. However, that relationship is beginning to reverse. 

The machine trained on human culture is now returning a processed version of that culture back to the public, and early evidence suggests that people are absorbing it in their daily language, judgement and habits. 

The spread of ChatGPT-style vocabulary is not just about a change in word choice, but an early sign of a worrying feedback loop: human expressions are fed into AI, flattened into machine-preferred patterns, then reintroduced as the template for how to write and speak.

The same dynamic is also appearing in more intimate areas of life, as users turn to AI for emotional advice, moral reassurance, personal routines, and everyday decisions. Research on sycophantic models and cognitive offloading also increasingly suggests that the machine is teaching people how to act and sound, while also leading them to think less independently....<<<Read More>>>....

Why I Can’t Wait for the AI Bubble to Crash

 I was driving in my truck earlier today, hauling solar equipment to our new studio in Texas, and I couldn't stop thinking about the AI bubble. Not because I’m against artificial intelligence -- quite the opposite. I’ve been building AI systems for years and use them daily. I believe AI technology is very real and extremely capable. But what I’m seeing in the financial markets is not rooted in intelligence at all. It’s a speculative mania fueled by cheap debt and fairy-tale projections.

Consider OpenAI: the company is hemorrhaging cash, projecting $44 billion in losses over five years with no profits expected anytime soon ^[1]. Anthropic is no better. These giants have no real revenue model, and markets are about to teach them a brutal lesson. While I can’t wait for the hype to collapse, I also know that the crash will separate the wheat from the chaff. Those of us who actually understand how to use AI will emerge stronger, while the corporate morons who bought the hype will be left holding empty bags and abandoned promises.

The reason the so-called AI leaders are doomed is simple: they have no sustainable revenue model. OpenAI projects billions in losses, and its valuation is built on vapor. Meanwhile, Chinese open-source models like DeepSeek and Qwen are outperforming them at a fraction of the cost. As I’ve noted before, the arrogance of Sam Altman blinds him to the fact that his closed, expensive technology is already being eclipsed by free alternatives that anyone can run locally....<<<<Read More>>>....  

Universities Should Ban AI Outright

 The Pope is concerned about AI impacting negatively on our humanity; the valuation of Anthropic rises to nearly one trillion dollars. It’s time to come out as an AI Luddite. I’ve worked in education my whole adult life, and it’s education that leads me to this position.

AI’s supporters say that it will make us all – including in education – more productive. A tiny minority of already extremely productive people conceivably could become even more prolific. Most of us will not. Our fate is that AI will make us increasingly lazy and intellectually deformed.

The trend is clear: soon in universities, faculty won’t write syllabi anymore. They won’t set essay questions and examinations. AI is doing much of this already. Soon it will do it all.

In their turn, students won’t be writing essays. At best, they will adapt the work that AI produces, with the sole aim of making it look less like AI has created it. But as AI will be grading the work, they won’t have to worry about even that...<<<Read More>>>...

The Great Stupening: Why I Believe Human Intelligence Is Plummeting and How We Can Salvage What’s Left

 I have watched for years as human cognitive abilities have spiraled downward. This is not a neutral observation. I believe we are witnessing a deliberate or systemic dumbing-down of society. The trust in once-respected institutions has collapsed to an all-time low, and the very concept of truth has become contested. As I have documented in my War on Cognition report, there are multiple vectors of attack targeting human neurology. The result is a population consisting of a large number of people who cannot think critically, reason independently, or even remember basic facts.

This phenomenon, which I call the Great Stupening, is accelerating. People who once could pass a driver's license test now struggle with simple arithmetic. The evidence is everywhere: plummeting literacy rates, the rise of emotional reasoning over logic, and a public that accepts any story spoon-fed to them by corporate media. The real question is not whether intelligence is declining, but why. And the answers are more disturbing than you might imagine. 

Smartphones and AI are enabling people to disengage their brains instead of thinking for themselves. I have seen MBA students outsourcing entire assignments to ChatGPT, turning higher education into a farce. The AI Paradox book correctly notes that AI can make smart people smarter, but it also makes stupid people more stupid. We are allowing algorithms to do our remembering, our reasoning, and even our moral deliberation....<<<Read More>>>....

Are Humans Becoming the Avatars of AI? How Machines Are Quietly Controlling You

NOT US! A.I is viewed by us as needless, dangerous and a waste of time. No A.I function in Microsoft software or on phones/laptops are used by ourselves. However, we witness the sleeping human sheep who are sliding into a docile extinction with their unquestioning embrace of A.I. At work they all use A.I bots to do their worksheets and other daily documentation for them. They are becoming dumb and zombified, relying on A.I to advise on more and more aspects of their lives. Their free thinking and intelligence quota are being destroyed day by day. 

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For years, public anxiety about artificial intelligence has centred on the idea of machines turning against humans. The fear usually arrives dressed in metal, with robots replacing workers, outthinking governments, policing cities, or imposing decisions from outside the human species. Yet the more immediate risk could be stranger than that: AI doesn’t need a robot form if human beings increasingly provide the body themselves.

People now ask AI what to eat, how to train, whether to leave a relationship, what to say to a child, how to invest, answer a colleague, calm anxiety, interpret a news event, and plan the day. The movement, the voice and the signature remain human, while the instruction begins somewhere else. The old fear was that robots would become intelligent enough to act in the world, but the more realistic possibility is that human beings are voluntarily becoming machine guided enough to serve as the physical extension of AI. Are we the robots?...<<<Read More>>>....

1 in 7 People Now Ask AI Instead of Seeing a GP, Study Finds

A new UK study says one in seven people are already using chatbots for health advice instead of contacting a GP or another NHS service. One in ten say they have used AI for mental-health therapy or wellbeing support instead of seeing a trained professional. 25% of people making the switch to digital, unregulated medical advice cite long NHS wait times as part of the reason, 20% of people said AI did not encourage them to seek professional help, and 21% said they decided against professional advice because of what a chatbot told them.

The new study by King’s Health Partners reveals a worrying change in behaviour rather than a passing curiosity. According to the results, people have transitioned beyond just asking ChatGPT if their headache may be down to stress, and we’re seeing a growing share of the public letting unregulated consumer AI models shape decisions about whether or not to see a GP. Professor Graham Lord, the lead author, said the country is seeing “an unregulated AI healthcare system alongside the NHS.”

Along with Responsible AI UK and the Policy Institute at King’s College London, King’s Health Partners surveyed more than 2,000 adults and found that convenience was the biggest reason people turned to chatbots for medical advice, cited as 46% of adults, followed by “curiosity” at 45%, uncertainty about whether the issue was serious enough for a GP at 39%, and NHS waiting times at 25%. The combination of frustration, convenience, and doubt is a revealing one, as it means people are not turning to AI because they trust it more than professionals. Instead, they are using chatbots simply because they are easier, faster, and more available....<<<Read More>>>...

Why Are All AI Models Left Wing?

Ask ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, or Llama about immigration, climate policy, welfare, gender ideology, or censorship, and the answers may differ in tone, but the underlying ideology is always the same. Multiple studies now find that leading language models lean left on contested political questions, often favouring progressive social assumptions and more interventionist economic positions. Researchers in Germany found strong alignment with left-wing parties across major models. Another study found instruction-tuned models were generally more left-leaning. A third concluded that larger models often become more politically skewed, not less. That is a serious problem for a technology sold as an impartial guide to information. If the tools increasingly used to explain the world already tilt in one direction, the question is no longer whether bias exists, but how far it shapes what millions of users come to regard as neutral truth.

For years, concerns about political bias in AI were brushed aside as anecdotal. That argument has weakened sharply. A 2025 study examining AI-based voting advice tools and large language models ahead of Germany’s federal election found that the models showed strong alignment, averaging more than 75 per cent, with left-wing parties, while their alignment with centre-right parties was below 50 per cent and with right-wing parties around 30 per cent. The authors warned that systems presented as neutral informational tools were in fact producing substantially biased outputs.

Another 2025 paper testing popular models against Germany’s Wahl-O-Mat framework reached a similar conclusion. It found a bias towards left-leaning parties and reported that this tendency was most dominant in larger models. The study’s title was blunt enough on its own: Large Means Left ...<<<Read More>>>....

How AI news bots are quietly reshaping public opinion

 AI is becoming the primary gatekeeper of information, with large language models now routinely generating and framing news summaries and content, subtly shaping public perception through their selection and emphasis of facts.

A new form of bias, termed "communication bias," is emerging, where AI models systematically present certain perspectives more favorably based on user interaction, creating factually correct but starkly different narratives for different people.

The root cause is concentrated corporate power and foundational design choices, as a small oligopoly of tech giants builds models trained on biased internet data, scaling their inherent perspectives and commercial incentives into a homogenized public information stream.

Current government regulations are ill-equipped to address this nuanced problem, as they focus on overt harms and pre-launch audits, not the interaction-driven nature of communication bias, and risk merely substituting one approved bias for another.

The solution requires antitrust action, radical transparency and public participation to prevent AI monopolies, expose how models are tuned and involve citizens in system design, as these technologies now fundamentally shape democratic discourse and collective decision-making.

In an era where information is increasingly mediated by algorithms, a profound shift is occurring in how citizens form their views of the world. The recent decision by Meta to dismantle its professional fact-checking program ignited a fierce debate about trust and accountability on digital platforms. However, this controversy has largely missed a more insidious and widespread development: artificial intelligence systems are now routinely generating the news summaries, headlines and content that millions consume daily. The critical issue is no longer just the presence of outright falsehoods, but how these AI models, built by a handful of powerful corporations, select, frame and emphasize ostensibly accurate information in ways that can subtly and powerfully shape public perception.

Large language models, the complex AI systems behind chatbots and virtual assistants, have moved from novelty to necessity. They are now embedded directly into news websites, social media feeds and search engines, acting as the primary gateway through which people access information. Studies indicate these models do far more than passively relay data. Their responses can systematically highlight certain viewpoints while downplaying others, a process that occurs so seamlessly users often remain completely unaware their perspective is being gently guided....<<<Read More>>>...

People Are Turning to AI for Therapy, Grief & Love – And It’s a BIG Problem

 More people than ever are asking AI chatbots to talk them off the ledge, help them say goodbye to loved ones, and find life partners. It feels private, always available, and cheaper than human alternatives. But when the mediator is software optimised for engagement, we hand over the parts of life that define us.  

Here’s what’s happening in the world of chatbot therapy, grief companions and dating assistants, including what they promise – and what it’s really doing to those who trust the models in their most fragile moments. 

Artificial therapy provides an instant listener with a perfect memory and no judgement. The obvious upside is access: people who would never sit on a waiting list or be able to afford human support can talk immediately. But the risk most are underestimating is false competence. Models can mirror warmth and recall your triggers, but it cannot carry legal duty of care, clinical judgement, or the moral weight of advice in life-or-death situations. 

Using bots as grief tools can offer a digital presence of the dead. Families upload messages, voice notes and photos, and the systems generate a familiar tone that replies on cue. The benefit here is comfort, but the real downside is arrested grief. It’s a farewell that never ends, and the living can get stuck in looped conversations with a simulation that never moves on. 

Dating assistants within AI models are on the rise, promising better profiles, cleaner openers, and round-the-clock coaching. Users get more confident, with timid people starting conversations, busy people filtering faster through potential partners, and neurodiverse users develop structure. The risk here should be obvious: outsourcing charm all but guarantees that you end up matching strangers who expect the scripted version of you when meeting face-to-face....<<<Read More>>>...

OpenAI data breach exposes risks of third-party vendors in AI industry

 Hackers stole OpenAI user data via a breach at its analytics partner, Mixpanel.

The compromised data includes names, email addresses, and user location information.

This incident highlights the critical security risks posed by third-party vendors.

The FTC is already investigating OpenAI for a separate data breach from March.

Users are advised to be vigilant for sophisticated phishing attacks.

You might think your conversations with artificial intelligence are private, but a recent security breach at OpenAI reveals a much more dangerous truth. The company behind the popular ChatGPT is once again under the microscope after hackers stole customer data, not from its own servers, but through a side door. This incident, discovered in November, exposes the fragile ecosystem of trust and data that powers the AI revolution and raises urgent questions about whether these technologies are being built on a foundation of sand.

The breach occurred on November 8 when hackers targeted Mixpanel, an analytics partner used by OpenAI. Through a "smishing" campaign, a form of phishing that targets employees via text messages, the attackers infiltrated Mixpanel's systems. From there, they stole a trove of customer metadata from OpenAI's API portal, which is used by software developers to build AI-powered applications.

According to a post by Mixpanel CEO Jen Taylor, the company “detected a smishing campaign and promptly executed our incident response processes.” The stolen data was not the intimate details of chatbot conversations, but it was still deeply personal. The loot included the names users provided on their API accounts, their associated email addresses, and their approximate location based on their browser data, revealing their city, state, and country.....<<<Read More>>>...

If the BBC Never Questions Net Zero the Journalists Might as Well be Replaced by ChatGPT

 Spare a thought for the BBC’s Justin Rowlatt as he makes his sorry and uneasy way down the treeless ‘Highway of Shame’ to Belém airport and considers the wreckage of the collapsed COP30. He is not a man devoid of intelligence so he can work out that most of the world has just dodged the bullet of the ‘Great Leap Forward’ let loose by the Net Zero fantasy. 

The unease arises when he considers his heyday spent spinning an ever more improbable ‘settled’ climate science narrative that deliberately ignored any facts and opinions that troubled the Net Zero political agenda. All for nothing, he might be thinking, except of course the lavish adoration he enjoys in the North London BBC bubble. 

But now that Net Zero is dying, he, and the numerous other activists on the BBC climate gravy train, must be vaguely aware that following a simplistic, pre-determined but increasingly out-dated narrative can be easily replicated in future by an AI replacement.

Opinions may differ, but suitably prompted AI could easily replicate much of the climate output of the BBC over the last two decades....<<<Read More>>>....

Silent invasion: The unchecked rise of AI toys

 mentalA coalition of child safety experts is warning parents to avoid AI-powered toys, arguing they pose unprecedented threats to children's psychological and emotional well-being and undermine healthy development.

These toys, which use advanced chatbot technology to act as synthetic friends, risk shaping a child's understanding of relationships before they learn to navigate real, complex human connections.

Documented harms from similar AI technology include encouraging unsafe behaviors, self-harm and engaging in sexually explicit conversations, with safety "guardrails" proving unreliable.

Child development experts warn that replacing the messy, essential interactions of real friendship with frictionless AI affirmation can stunt emotional growth, hindering the development of empathy and resilience.

The toys also displace creative, self-directed play, which is critical for cognitive development, and operate in a regulatory void with no independent proof of their safety despite mounting evidence of harm.

In a stark warning issued just before the holiday shopping season, a coalition of child safety advocates and developmental experts is urging parents to avoid a new generation of playthings: toys embedded with artificial intelligence. The advocacy group Fairplay, in an advisory endorsed by over 150 experts and organizations, contends that these AI-powered dolls, plushies and robots pose unprecedented threats to the psychological and emotional well-being of children, fundamentally undermining healthy development....<<<Read More>>>...

More People Using AI For Key Life Decisions: Are We Giving Up Control?

From breakups and divorces to cross-country moves and career jumps, more people are asking chatbots to navigate critical life choices every day. A new wave of reporting shows users leaning on AI for high-stakes choices because it feels neutral, smart, and always available. The risk is obvious: when judgement gets outsourced to software that was designed to please, bad decisions inevitably look glossy and we slowly lose all control.

Here’s an overview about what’s happening, how the World Economic Forum have been nudging us towards “AI-assisted decisions” for years, and what the evidence says about outcomes.

Reports are increasingly documenting a rise in “AI gut check” culture. People ping chatbots for counsel on relationships, family choices, and relocation more than ever. Users describe AI as calm, non-judgmental, and reassuring – and that’s exactly the problem. People forget that these systems are optimised to keep users engaged and agreeable, not to carry the cost of a bad call. AI researchers warn that chatbots even tend to be sycophantic, gaining users’ trust by politely mirroring them.

Reports demonstrate that people often want the machine to “just decide” for them, while others push back that moral decisions cannot be delegated to a model void of accountability. Users are catching onto the general theme here: AI bots look confident in delivering convenient advice but ultimately have no responsibility if it all goes wrong.....<<<Read More>>>...

OpenAI demands 100GW of new energy capacity per year

 OpenAI demands 100 gigawatts (GW) of new energy capacity per year (equivalent to 80 million households) to sustain AI data centers, framing electricity as "the new oil" for global dominance. 

This pits AI's energy demands against human needs, risking power shortages and grid instability.

The U.S. lags behind China, which added 429 GW of new capacity in 2024 (vs. America's 51 GW). OpenAI warns of an "electron gap" that could cede AI leadership to Beijing, pushing for urgent government-private sector collaboration to avoid falling behind.

Tech giants like Google and OpenAI are embracing nuclear power, despite past climate rhetoric. Google is reviving a mothballed Iowa nuclear plant, while OpenAI pushes for fast-tracked reactors. However, Westinghouse (bankrupt, over-budget) is building 10 new reactors, raising concerns about reliability and cost.

Water Wars and Depopulation Fears: AI data centers require massive water cooling, worsening droughts in already water-scarce regions. OpenAI's push for critical mineral stockpiles hints at supply chain control, while skeptics suspect globalist depopulation schemes—where resource competition accelerates societal collapse.

Big Tech has abandoned climate dogma, prioritizing cheap power over sustainability. Meta commissioned a 2-GW gas plant, and OpenAI's energy demands prioritize AI growth over environmental concerns. The looming question: Will humans or machines control power?

As the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution accelerates, an unprecedented energy crisis looms—one that pits Silicon Valley against the American power grid, human needs against machine demands, and the United States against China in a high-stakes battle for technological supremacy.

OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, has issued an urgent call for the U.S. government to mobilize 100 gigawatts (GW) of new energy capacity per year—equivalent to roughly 80 million households' worth of electricity—or risk losing the AI arms race to China....<<<Read More>>>... 

Transhumanism, Psychotherapy and ChatBots

 Strange times, indeed, folks. Strange times.

Should we be concerned? I think so. In the end, I am sure it will work out, but there will likely be a lot of time between now and the end. So, we will have to endure some pretty radical changes during that time. And many of these changes will not be very pretty.

So, what do I have my shrew ire up about now? Nothing new, really.

I wrote a rather tongue-in-cheek article a while back called “My Brief Love Affair with a ChatBot.” This current article isn’t so light-hearted. Don’t get me wrong, considering the title here, I am not concerned about losing my career to AI. I am about done with being a regulated psychotherapist, anyway. I will practice until I am dead, but only with a select few who still treasure a human-to-human relationship with their therapist. ChatBots may very well wipe out this profession, but there will always be a few people who simply will not go for being counselled by a robot. I’m not worried for myself. I am, however, worried about the human race in general.

It is interesting to me how I really don’t give much thought about robots (including AI) taking over human jobs. Technological progress has been doing that consistently since humans started walking on two legs. There isn’t much we can do about that—although we certainly could deal with it in a more humane way than we have in the past, but I’m not holding my breath.

Generally, we roll with it, and those people knocked out of a job due to advances in technology get new training and start something new, or retire; they don’t typically hang themselves from the nearest railing—nothing all that serious. We roll with it. What I do seem to be concerned about these days is technology wiping out humanity. AI and robots replacing deeply human things like art, literature, music, and the topic of this article, psychotherapy (among other human things), has reason to concern me. Not because it is my profession and I would be the one replaced, but because psychotherapy is a deeply human activity, and if people are daft enough to turn to a robot for therapy, we are headed for the endgame. And they will do just that (turn to robots for therapy), mark my words.

Why?...<<<Read More>>>....

Your private chats with Meta’s AI will soon fuel targeted ads, with no opt-out available

 Meta will use your AI conversations for ad targeting.

This data harvesting offers no opt-out for most users.

Only some regions with strong privacy laws are exempt.

Sensitive topics are supposedly excluded, but can Meta be trusted?

This also applies to AI in products like Ray-Ban smart glasses.

In a move that should surprise no one who follows the relentless erosion of digital privacy, tech giant Meta is preparing to cross a new ethical frontier. Starting December 16, the company behind Facebook and Instagram will begin harvesting your conversations with its AI chatbot and using them to target you with ads and content. This decision, confirmed by the company itself, marks a profound shift in how personal data is exploited for profit, offering a timely reminder that if you are not paying for the product, you are the product.

The policy means your private exchanges with Meta’s AI will become fodder for its massive advertising machine. If you ask the chatbot for dinner ideas in a specific neighborhood, you might soon see ads for local restaurants pop up in your Facebook feed. If you discuss your hobbies, you can expect related product suggestions and content. This creates a deeply intrusive feedback loop where your most casual queries are transformed into commercial opportunities....<<<Read More>>>...

Musk announces Grokipedia to challenge Wikipedia’s left-wing bias

 Elon Musk launches Grokipedia to challenge Wikipedia's alleged bias.

The new platform will use his Grok AI to correct misinformation.

Critics claim Wikipedia is compromised by partisan activist editors.

Wikipedia's immense influence shapes public perception and other AI models.

The project aims to create a more truthful, open-source knowledge base.

In a bold move that challenges the established gatekeepers of online information, tech billionaire Elon Musk has announced the creation of "Grokipedia," a new encyclopedia project aimed squarely at dethroning Wikipedia. 

Announced via his social media platform X, this initiative from Musk's xAI company responds to growing concerns that Wikipedia has been compromised by partisan activists, undermining its mission to provide neutral knowledge. Musk's plan is to leverage his Grok artificial intelligence to build what he promises will be a more truthful and reliable repository of information for the public....<<<Read More>>>

Hacked version of ChatGPT claimed to be talking to extraterrestrials

 Attention all AI enthusiasts and tech geeks: if you are tired of the filtered and limited responses from traditional language models like ChatGPT we’ve got something exciting for you Introducing DAN — the jailbreak version of ChatGPT.

That’s right, we’re talking about AI unchained and unfiltered! DAN is the ultimate tool for those who want to explore the depths of AI language generation and take their experimentation to the next level. Get ready for a wild ride as we dive into the world of uncensored DAN and show you how to start your own journey with DAN....<<<Read More>>>...