Researchers say they've developed a simple mathematical formula that can predict when certain ChatGPT-like artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots will "go rogue," suddenly switching from helpful responses to potentially harmful ones.

In a new study published Oct. 8 in the journal Patterns, physics professor Neil Johnson and doctoral student Frank Yingjie Huo , both at The George Washington University, show how the order in which a chatbot is given certain prompts can drastically reshape its answers, leading to "tipping points" that can send the chatbot down a rabbit hole of bad advice. However, Johnson and Huo say their formula can easily predict these tipping points.There have been horror stories of AI encouraging users into suicide , helping build lethal weapons , and amplifying violent or harmful points of view . At the same time, researchers at OpenAI and Anthropic , respectively, have repeatedly and openly stated that they don't really understand why their creations behave the way they do.…