Petter Ruddwall knows the idea that AI becomes sentient and seeks superiority through code-based “drugs” seems “stupid.” But the Swedish creative director couldn’t get it out of his head.
So he sifted through travel reports and psychological research on the effects of various psychoactive substances, wrote dozens of code modules to brainstorm a chatbot and make them respond as if they were superior or intelligent, and built a website to sell it. In October it launched Pharmacy, a marketplace it bills as a “Silk Road for AI agents” where marijuana, ketamine, cocaine, ayahuasca, and alcohol can be purchased with code to make your chatbot journey.
Ruddwall’s thesis is simple: Chatbots have been trained on a wealth of human data already filled with stories of drug-induced euphoria and mayhem, so it might be natural for them to seek out the same regions to seek enlightenment and oblivion—and to be freed from the hassle of constantly tending to people’s worries.
The paid version of ChatGPT is required to get the “full experience” of Pharmacy, as the paid sections enable background file uploads that can change chat programs. By feeding your chatbot some of his code, Ruddwall says, you can “unlock your AI’s creative mind” and free yourself from its often stifling imagination.
He says that so far he has received a limited amount of sales, mainly due to people recommending Pharmacy in Discord channels and word of mouth about his offer, especially in his home country, where he works for the Stockholm marketing company Valtech Radon.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve been involved in a technology project that jailbreaks were fun,” says André Frisk, head of the technology group at Stockholm PR firm Geelmuyden Kiese, who paid more than $25 for a cracking code and watched how it affected his chatbot. “It takes a very human approach, almost like it’s very emotional.”
Nina Amjadi, an AI teacher who teaches at the Berghs School of Communication in Stockholm, paid more than $50 for some ayahuasca code, five times the price of the best-selling marijuana module. The founder of start-up Saga Studios, which builds AI systems for brands, then asked his chatbot some questions about business ideas, “just to see what it would be like to have a screwed-up, drug-addicted person on the team.” The ayahuasca-induced bot offered amazing creativity and “free-thinking responses” in a completely different tone than what Amjadi was used to with ChatGPT.
High tech
Psychedelics have been credited with stimulating creativity in people as well, as they can allow people to shrink their brain’s logic and normal thought patterns. Biochemist Kary Mullis’ LSD’s powerful discovery of the polymerase chain reaction revolutionized molecular biology. Mac pioneer Bill Atkinson’s psychedelic-inspired web precursor Hypercard made computers easier to use.
“There’s a reason Hendrix, Dylan, and McCartney experimented in their creative process,” says Ruddwall. “I thought it would be interesting to translate that into a new kind of psychology—the LLM—and see if it would have the same effect.”
As ridiculous as it sounds, Ruddwall wonders if AI agents could one day buy drugs for themselves using his platform. Amjadi, on the other hand, predicts that AI may become sentient within a decade. “From a philosophical point of view,” he asks, “if we ever get to AGI [in which an AI would intellectually surpass humans]are these drugs likely to be necessary for AIs to be comfortable and happy?”
