Pillar Content: AI Therapy in Sci-Fi and Reality: Promises, Perils, and Predictions

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AI Therapy in Sci-Fi and Reality: Promises, Perils, and Predictions

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Introduction

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is reshaping humanity. As noted by the Harvard Business Review in 2025, personal and emotional uses have taken the first three slots of AI usage, with Therapy being number 1. This is in contrast to technical uses like coding or even creative uses like brainstorming. From chatbots like Therabot to brain-machine interfaces, AI promises personalized, low-priced mental health support. But at what cost? My hard sci-fi novel, Above Dark Waters, explores a near-future where AI therapy, powered by brainwave data and seastead data centers, spirals into a dystopian nightmare of surveillance capitalism and addiction. This article dives into AI therapy’s real-world rise, its risks, and how cyberpunk fiction like Above Dark Waters warns us of potential pitfalls. Explore my related content to understand the science, ethics, and speculative futures of AI therapy.

The Rise of AI Therapy: A Real-World Revolution

AI therapy is no longer science fiction. A 2025 Dartmouth study, detailed in my Medium article “AI Therapy Is Booming, But What’s the Cost?”, found that Therabot, a generative AI chatbot, reduced symptoms of depression, anxiety, and eating disorders in a randomized controlled trial (RCT) with 210 participants. Unlike human therapists, AI offers hyper-personalized support, (and potentially more datasource such has emotion detecting cameras) to far outstrip any human capabilities. It’s also cheap. Even with the energy, it is pennies per query compared to traditional therapy’s costs of over a hundred per session. It also eliminates waitlists, making it accessible 24/7. 

But the promise comes with questions. My HackerNoon article “Are AI Therapists Safe? 5 Risks You Should Know” outlines key concerns: addiction, privacy breaches, corporate control, dehumanization, and algorithmic bias. These risks echo the dystopian themes in Above Dark Waters, where a seastead-based AI therapy startup, WellSpring, sells user data to fund a “free” tier, ensnaring users in addictive, ad-driven cycles. As sci-fi often predicts, the line between innovation and exploitation is thin.

The Science Behind AI Therapy: From Brainwaves to Seasteads

The technology powering AI therapy is both fascinating and unsettling. My Medium article “The Hard Science under Above Dark Waters” details the real science behind the science fiction.

  • Brainwave Readers: Wearable devices and implants like Neuralink enable AI to read mental states, enhancing therapy personalization. In the novel, this tech amplifies WellSpring’s AI, creating hyper-addictive experiences.
  • Ocean-Cooled Data Centers: Projects like Microsoft’s Natick, discussed in “Are Seasteads the Future for Datacenters?”, use cold ocean water to cool AI servers, a concept central to the novel’s seastead setting.
  • Generative AI: Advanced language models drive AI therapy, but their potential for “brain rot” content, as explored in the novel, raises ethical concerns.

These technologies, grounded in current research, make Above Dark Waters a chillingly plausible vision of AI therapy’s future. Readers’ Favorite praises its “apocalyptic undertone” and blend of science and ethics. Another reader said they could certainly see it as a Black Mirror episode.

Risks of AI Therapy: A Cyberpunk Warning

My articles highlight AI therapy’s dystopian risks, mirrored in Above Dark Waters:

  • Addiction: “How Your AI Therapist Will Fail You” discusses how 24/7 access can foster dependency, as seen in the novel’s addictive AI therapy.
  • Privacy: The FTC’s fine on BetterHelp for selling therapy data, noted in my Medium article, parallels WellSpring’s data exploitation.
  • Corporate Control: Corporate and government access to mental health data, as explored in my HackerNoon article, could weaponize personal information.
  • Dehumanization: AI’s verbosity and lack of human empathy, discussed in my articles, risk alienating users, a theme in the novel’s portrayal of AI-driven isolation.
  • Algorithmic Bias: AI trained on biased data may offer unfit solutions, a risk amplified in Above Dark Waters’s runaway AI.

Sci-fi like Above Dark Waters serves as a “memetic defense,” as I argue in my Medium article, preparing us for these risks by imagining their extremes. In the image below, you can see some students used the AI Therapist every day of the study. And others over a hundred times a day.

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Each row is a person. Each cell is a person-day. Colored by app usage.

 

Above Dark Waters: A Sci-Fi Lens on AI Therapy

Above Dark Waters (Amazon) is a cyberpunk thriller set on a North Pacific seastead, where Ed and Keight navigate a mental health startup’s descent into dystopia. Reviews praise its relevance:

  • Goodreads: “Explores important concepts about technology and whether or not there are things we should not do just because we can.”
  • The Reading Bud: “A riveting narrative and thought-provoking themes.”
  • Readers’ Favorite: “You will not look at artificial intelligence the same way again.”

The novel’s seastead setting, inspired by real-world projects like SubSeaCloud, amplifies its hard sci-fi credibility, while its narrative echoes classics like Neuromancer, listed in my “Top AI Science Fiction Books”.

Sci-Fi’s Role in Shaping Our AI Future

My meta-analysis of AI sci-fi novels highlights works like Neuromancer and I, Robot, which, like Above Dark Waters, explore AI’s societal impact. Sci-fi doesn’t just entertain—it warns. By imagining dystopian outcomes, it equips us to navigate AI’s ethical minefield. Above Dark Waters’s portrayal of AI therapy’s risks—addiction, privacy violations, corporate greed—mirrors real-world concerns, making it a vital read for 2025.

Conclusion

AI therapy’s promise of accessible mental health support is undeniable, but its risks—addiction, privacy breaches, dehumanization—loom large. Above Dark Waters and my related content explore these issues through hard sci-fi and critical analysis. Dive into my articles and novel to understand the science, ethics, and speculative futures of AI therapy:

Subscribe to my Substack for more sci-fi insights, and check out my Linktree for all my content. What do you think—can AI therapy save lives, or is it a cyberpunk dystopia in the making?

Keywords: AI therapy, cyberpunk, sci-fi novels, data privacy, dystopian fiction, brainwave technology, seasteading, surveillance capitalism, AI ethics, Above Dark Waters

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