The fake disease that fooled AI

愚弄人工智能的假疾病

Science Quickly

2026-05-22

14 分钟
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Have you ever turned to an artificial intelligence chatbot for medical advice? In this episode of Science Quickly, host Rachel Feltman speaks with researcher Almira Osmanovic Thunström about an experiment in which she created “bixonimania,” a fake disease that AI chatbots easily absorbed and repeated to users. The experiment reveals the pitfalls of using AI to interpret medical results—a habit that’s becoming increasingly common these days. Recommended Reading: “Scientists invented a fake disease. AI told people it was real,” by Chris Stokel-Walker, in Nature. Published online April 7, 2026 A third of Americans say they’ve asked AI to decode their medical results E-mail us at sciencequickly@sciam.com if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new everyday: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter. Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Sushmita Pathak and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura, with fact-checking by Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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  • Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes.

  • At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building.

  • Fit for your ambition.

  • First Citizens Bank.

  • For Scientific American Science Quickly, I'm Rachel Feltman.

  • Have your eyes ever felt sore and itchy after spending too much time staring at a screen?

  • You might have a condition known as Bixonomania.

  • Or at least that's what several popular AI-powered chatbots might have told you if you'd asked last year.

  • Millions of people around the world turn to AI chatbots for medical advice every day,

  • often as a supplement to a doctor's visit, but also sometimes in place of it.

  • That can lead to dangerous consequences, and in rare cases, even death.

  • Our guest today is Elmira Osmanovic-Tunström.

  • She's a researcher at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden

  • and at the Solgrenska University Hospital, Center for Digital Health, and Chalmers Industrotechnik.

  • She's also the creator of Bixonomania.

  • She says this totally made-up disease reveals some very real problems

  • with the way we train and use large language models.

  • Thank you so much for coming on to chat with us today.

  • Thank you so much for inviting me.

  • So you recently did an interesting project involving AI.