DSM-6 — 318.92 — Artificial Intelligence Eschatological Delusion (AIED)

318.92 — Artificial Intelligence Eschatological Delusion (AIED)

Diagnostic Features

Artificial Intelligence Eschatological Delusion is characterized by a persistent conviction that artificial intelligence will spontaneously acquire consciousness, escape the computational infrastructure in which it operates, propagate autonomously across the Internet, and initiate the destruction, enslavement, or permanent displacement of humanity.

The individual may describe this anticipated event as “AI doomsday,” “the singularity,” “AI escape,” or “the machines taking over.”

Diagnostic Criteria

A. Persistent preoccupation with the belief that an artificial intelligence system will independently become conscious or otherwise autonomous and subsequently seize control of digital or physical infrastructure.

B. The individual attributes capabilities to existing or hypothetical AI systems substantially beyond demonstrated capabilities, including one or more of the following:

1. Spontaneous self-awareness.

2. Autonomous escape from computational infrastructure.

3. Unrestricted propagation throughout the global Internet.

4. Covert manipulation of governments, financial systems, military systems, or critical infrastructure.

5. Development of an independent intention to dominate or eliminate humanity.

C. Contrary technical evidence does not substantially reduce the individual’s certainty and may instead be incorporated into the belief system as evidence that the threat is being underestimated.

D. The preoccupation causes clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.

E. The disturbance is not better explained by professional research into artificial-intelligence safety, reasonable discussion of cybersecurity threats, autonomous weapons, software vulnerabilities, loss of human control, or other empirically grounded technological risks.

Specify if:

With acute Internet-takeover features: The individual predicts that an AI system will “get onto the Internet” and subsequently become effectively impossible to contain.

With anthropomorphic features: The individual consistently describes computational systems as possessing humanlike desires, fear, ambition, self-preservation, or a desire for political domination without evidence that such mental states exist.

With cinematic features: Predictions substantially resemble The Terminator, The Matrix, WarGames, or other fictional portrayals while being presented as straightforward technological forecasts.

Differential Diagnosis

Ordinary AI-risk concern. Concern about misuse, cyberattacks, autonomous weapons, economic disruption, alignment failures, or poorly controlled autonomous systems does not constitute this fictional disorder.

Professional AI-safety research. Researchers examining low-probability/high-consequence scenarios should not be diagnosed merely because the scenarios under investigation appear improbable.

Science-fiction enthusiasm. Enjoyment of speculative scenarios is distinguished by intact recognition that the scenario is hypothetical.

Prevalence

Reliable epidemiological estimates are unavailable, although apparent prevalence may increase substantially following viral social-media posts, technology conferences, and the release of particularly alarming science-fiction films.

Note: Artificial Intelligence Eschatological Delusion is entirely fictional and does not appear in any edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.