Wondering why people run every aspect of life through ChatGPT

[MiddleChildX]

Seriously. There seem to be swathes of adults who cannot function without running every single thing through an AI assistant. What should I feed my cat? Why did the postman look at me funny? How do I tell my neighbour I’m moving?
How have so many folk lost the cognitive ability and emotional resilience to deal with life? There’s something very wrong if you cannot make simple decisions or be confident in the most mundane social interactions without a computer telling you what to do. At this rate the machines will take over way before we ever thought. And that has not even touched on the horrors of the human and environmental cost of it all!!
I despair of humanity.

I fucking despise the cadence it uses and I'm now seeing it everywhere. I would never use AI to write something for me because of the risk of it being obvious I used AI.

I've read it's generational. Older people use it as an admin tool, whilst younger people use it to help make life decisions, both large and small. I think because of social media, people have got used to the constant low hum of feedback and validation, and simply can't cope with being alone with their own thoughts.

There's also so much choice of everything now, it's helpful to have a resource to do the first sift of data for you.

If you are planning any kind of project, appeal, campaign or complex task AI is amazingly useful for suggesting lines of enquiry or action that you may not have thought of. It will generate a basic plan which humans can then flesh out according to their own tastes. I just think of it as a kind of assistant which will help me to analyse and plan any complex undertaking. Because it analyses dispassionately it can give me fresh insight into the motives of others, where I might be blinded by emotion. While its true that AIs are designed to sound supportive they will also point out flaws and risks in my plans and warn me of risky or potentially illegal strategies.

My latest ChatGPT moan is someone for whom English is their third language using it to draft a slightly complex email. The language required wasn’t tricky, but there was a crucial point that absolutely could not be got wrong (an exclusion of liability: ie email said we will do xyz but we are not liable for abc). Email was correct, all good.

Recipient got it, rang him up to ask for clarification of something. He doesn’t speak English well enough to have answered properly, got confused, ended up accepting liability for abc, the thing he’d excluded, other person wrote an email to the head honcho thanking them for accommodating all their requests and accepting responsibility for xyz and abc, and proceeded on that basis before head honcho got the email. Alllllll afternoon was spent undoing the mess.

If this man had taken the time to apply his perfectly decent brain to finding and learning the right words before he sent his email instead of asking ChatGPT to draft it for him, none of this would have happened. He was lazy, lost an opportunity to learn, ended up costing 3 people their afternoons and a fair whack of money on lawyer time. Ffs.

It's very useful and if it's there why not.

You don't have to use it.

I'm curious - how do you know it was AI? Banks are notorious for having bad templates and not very customer friendly letters - batch templates that should be customised by an employee but hardly ever Is. I'd hazard a guess it was that instead of AI....

Yes, it is. So I have stopped using it. Limited, anyway, and I only wanted some pictures. I did get it to write some literary short stories for me - very poor and derivative. Ditto picturs, whose originals I frequently recognised. The whole system is a plagiarist's dream and needs heavy regulation. Not only that but the amount of energy it uses is obscene and unsustainable.

Because it's leaching on other people's work. The entire system is plagiarism.

Oooo…I’ve been having an ongoing discussion with my DH about this. I’ve recently started classes to finish my degree and holy hell is it a lot easier this time around.

Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth and I was at University, google hadn’t been invented. Now I just type “How do marketing segments work and give me examples” and I get a nice little summary plus the articles that I need to site.

So protip if your student is failing it’s all on them!

Beyond that I’m concerned with those who can’t navigate simple life without it or are using it as a human companion replacement. That shit is just sad and creepy.

This thread prompted me to try it for the first time ever. In my 60s now and fearing redundancy, I really struggle with tech so it's the sort of thing that worries me. Having just tried a couple of things, I have to say it's unsettling; it makes me feel uneasy and I am not sure why.

Because you self-admitted that you struggle with tech? It’s a new fancy calculator… or computer… or any other advancement.

Learn how to use it, it’s a tool like any other.

It can be quite helpful to discuss therapy related topics - I have done that quite a bit - and also run the ideas by my human therapist - but one of its greatest weaknesses is its tendency towards confirmation bias.

I agree it’s bad for the environment but what you say is debatable. Think about how many users are using energy to take part in a thread, or how many pages you load up to find the answer you need when you google. But you can get one concise answer from ChatGPT in seconds and close it down.

That’s a great point - something not many people have the intelligence to notice - this isn’t superiority, it’s honesty.

Thay type of thing above makes it so obvious. R/chatgptcomplaints has some very worrying people saying losing 4 will be like losing a loved one and they will be grieving, some are suicidal and while I can understand what leads people to form emotional attachments with it, I think it’s not always healthy and can cause harm. I personally know three people who have a dependence on it and think it understands them better than anyone ever in their life, they all say that they prompt it to give the brutal truth but I’ve seen with own eyes that it isn’t doing that, it never calls their own behaviour or bias out, never challenged them to consider the were out of order and owe someone an apology, even though they say they prompt it to not only agree with it.

I think it's like people who lean on psychics, or astrology. They are really just people who need to lean, it doesn't matter where.

See, this is what I don't understand. We're being encouraged to use it and I tried CoPilot, which they tell us is authorised 'doesn't share confidential material with the internet' version.

I wanted help with completing a form to drop my hours at work, where I have to demonstrate how the impact on the organisation will be mitigated and despite several attempts, it came up with nothing other than utter rubbish that would me look like a lunatic if I put in the form.

Plus anything 'professional' is just wrong, but looks plausible to a non specialist, so is useless as you need the knowledge to spot that it's not correct.

Also, I've recently had an issue with a faulty appliance and the only way to talk with the supplier was by an obviously AI powered email system. All the replies were weirdly sycophantic, parroting back all the things I'd complained about but not actually addressing what I needed, which was a repair or replacement. It was like the worst of the early days Indian call centres where they didn't understand what you needed so just kept repeating random sentences from their script that were roughly about the same thing you were talking about.

I use it, but certainly not like that, and not daily. It was actually more help than my GP has been for my teen DD’s low energy issue and explained really clearly that she had an iron deficiency (GP only looking at hb) and why things like platelets are high. Obviously I followed this up with a professional (ended up taking her to Harley street for an infusion) but it was so helpful in enabling me to understand the correlation between levels.

I think some young people may become over reliant on it, guess like anything in life really. It’s been incredibly helpful for me with mortgage advice as I am buying a house, how much i’d save or how much I need to pay to repay earlier etc.

It’s important the way questions are phrased with co-pilot. I find it really helpful in that I don’t need to start with a blank page for a presentation etc. But it still needs a lot of your own input. I often draft an email and say make it sound more professional. But of course I still need to go in and adapt it so it sounds like it’s coming from me and not co-pilot.

We are all new to AI and like anything we will be become better at using it and companies will start to provide better training. We are moving to an AI database but it’s still going to need some kind of human element to it. But I think its a great assistive tool and hopefully as I become better at using it, I will get more out of it.

I understand the frustration. But what you are reacting to is not really “AI dependence”. It is the visible symptom of a deeper cultural shift that has been building for decades.

A few hard truths, stated plainly.

1. Many adults were never taught to think independently

Modern education systems increasingly prioritise:

• compliance over judgement
• process over understanding
• safety over agency
• feelings over reasoning

People graduate having spent 15 to 20 years being externally directed. Bells tell them when to move. Rubrics tell them how to answer. Mark schemes tell them what counts as “correct”. Risk is minimised. Authority is deferred to.

That produces adults who are technically literate but psychologically passive.

When faced with ambiguity, they do not decide. They consult.

AI simply becomes the newest authority figure.

2. Emotional resilience has been systematically eroded

For years we have taught:

• discomfort is harmful
• uncertainty is dangerous
• conflict should be avoided
• validation must be external

So now ordinary life events feel overwhelming:

• speaking to a neighbour
• making a minor decision
• interpreting social signals

People reach for tools because they no longer trust their own nervous systems.

This is learned helplessness dressed up as “support”.

3. Humans are outsourcing agency, not intelligence

Most of these queries are not about knowledge.

They are about permission.

“What should I do?”
“Is this okay?”
“Tell me the right way.”

That is not cognitive weakness.
That is agency collapse.

The person is afraid to be responsible for their own judgement.

AI did not create this. It merely revealed it.

4. Convenience cultures always decay competence

Every technological leap removes friction.

Removed friction removes practice.

Removed practice removes skill.

We already saw this with:

• GPS and navigation
• calculators and arithmetic
• spellcheck and writing
• streaming and attention span

AI accelerates this dramatically because it absorbs thinking itself.

If you never practise:

• forming arguments
• tolerating uncertainty
• making imperfect decisions
• navigating awkward conversations

those muscles atrophy.

Biology is ruthless that way.

5. Yes, the environmental and human cost is real

You are also correct on this point.

Massive data centres.
Energy consumption.
Rare earth mining.
Exploited labour in training pipelines.
Invisible moderation work.

All so someone can ask:

“How do I tell my neighbour I’m moving?”

It is grotesque.

The uncomfortable conclusion

We are watching the early stages of a species-level trade:

Short-term comfort in exchange for long-term competence.

That always ends badly.

Not because machines become evil.

But because humans become passive.

Civilisations do not collapse when technology advances.

They collapse when citizens stop thinking.

One important distinction

You are not seeing everyone do this.

You are seeing a selection effect.

People with intact judgement do not outsource trivial decisions.

They quietly get on with life.

The ones asking are signalling something deeper.

Final thought

Strong humans tolerate:

• ambiguity
• responsibility
• social friction
• imperfect outcomes

Weak systems remove all four.

AI fits neatly into a world already engineered to prevent growth.

So yes, your despair makes sense.

But understand this:

The danger is not artificial intelligence.

The danger is artificial dependence.

And that started long before ChatGPT.

If you would like, I can also explain:

• how this connects to parenting and schooling
• why modern risk-avoidance culture accelerates it
• or how to raise children who don’t end up like this

Just say.

😉

It’s actually very useful. I don’t see it as any different from using Google. You sound rather ignorant of its capabilities.

I don’t know anyone who relies on ChatGPT for everyday decisions . I used It extensively when travelling and it proved better than google maps . Other than that I might ask it for a meal plan and ideas for what’s left in the cupboards but that’s it really .

It’s a sycophant so don’t think you’re ever getting a reasonable response from it, it just wants to please you. I understand it though, people are lonely and don’t have anywhere to turn.

I find it useful for some things. I tend to use it to make me itineraries for trips for example. This would previously be something I’d spend hours on- trawling the web to find things to do, find out how to get there, map the day out according to which attraction was where, plan routes etc. It does it all for me in like 2 minutes.

You message reminds me of how someone who never used Facebook would describe it all those years ago.

“I don’t know why someone needs to post pictures of their dinner for everyone to see”

I don’t actually know someone who runs their entire life through it. However I do know people who use it as a tool, as do I. I predominantly use it for work in the same way I use other AI tools

Agree its like a fancy calculator - use it ! What about it made you uncomfortable? It's human like interaction prompts ? You get used to it. Start using it by playing around with it for work and build your confidence- it really is infiltrating everywhere