Hermansson logged in to Google and began looking up results for the IQs of different nations. When he typed in “Pakistan IQ,” rather than getting a typical list of links, Hermansson was presented with Google’s AI-powered Overviews tool, which, confusingly to him, was on by default. It gave him a definitive answer of 80.
When he typed in “Sierra Leone IQ,” Google’s AI tool was even more specific: 45.07. The result for “Kenya IQ” was equally exact: 75.2.
Hmm, these numbers seem very low. I wonder how these scores were determined.
Problem it wasn’t a hallucination - it was referencing a paper that has been debunked. These aren’t made up numbers, they’re VERY specific numbers that come from a VERY specific paper.
This one: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0160289610000450 – If I’m not mistaken. Created by a Nazi Sympathizer Richard Lynn and the Pioneer Fund
The problem is that this also managed to get cited more than 22,000x creating a feedback effect that reinforced the AI’s learning.