r/technology • u/Miserable_Phase_2519 • 14h ago

Artificial Intelligence Florida woman used Claude as a diary, then Anthropic reported an entry to police

https://www.techspot.com/news/114091-florida-woman-used-claude-diary-anthropic-reported-shoot.html
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u/ungoogleable 12h ago

That sounds like a weird quirk of the law they charged her with, not a reason to withhold reporting though.

Suppose she wrote her credible plans to shoot up the sheriff's office on a piece of paper then lost it on the street where you found it, shouldn't you still tell them about it? Even if planning to shoot up the sheriff's office is not technically a crime in itself and she didn't explicitly make a public threat, I believe Anthropic should report when someone credibly intends to commit harm to others.

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u/f_myeah 11h ago

It's impossible to decide if intent is "credible" without further physical evidence (stockpiling weapons etc). We're getting dangerously close to "pre-crime" a la Minority Report if we're charging people for their thoughts, whether recorded on paper or not.

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u/ungoogleable 10h ago edited 9h ago

We might argue about what constitutes the threshold for credibility, but to say there's no threshold at all is a pretty extreme position that I don't think is defensible. The more blatant, consistent, clear, specific, and unambiguous about their intent somebody is, any reasonable person is going to say it's credible. There are already many roles in society that are legally mandated to report such things (such as therapists).

Edit: We should also separate reporting from punishment. I agree merely having the mental intent to commit a crime should not trigger the same punishment as having committed the crime. But reporting might trigger actions other than criminal punishment, such as a mental health check or proactive security for the target.

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u/f_myeah 7h ago edited 7h ago

I think you brought the discussion back on track by distinguishing reporting from convicting.

Had she actually shot up the sheriff's office, a diary entry could be used to prove mens rea. Mens rea is only half of what should be required for a conviction though, the other half being actus reus, the guilty act.

She committed no actus reus and therefore should not be charged with a felony.