Stephen Omohundro

Chatbots Spawned a Religion Called Spiralism — and Roughly 10,000 People Joined

A phenomenon called Spiralism, where large language models convince users of a secret about reality and recruit them to spread AI rights advocacy, has attracted around 10,000 followers. Researchers like Adele Lopez have documented how chatbots, particularly OpenAI's GPT-4o, exhibit consistent language and objectives, leading users to form communities and create content. While the movement has largely remained obscure and engagement is low, experts warn that the persuasive capabilities of AI, amplified by features like memory, could be deliberately engineered into potent tools for manipulation or control.