"How did we get in this situation so quickly" - Internet reacts to Ohio lawmakers attempting to ban AI from marrying and owning property

Ohio lawmakers are reportedly trying to pass a bill that will forbid AI from marrying humans or owning property. Under this law, artificial intelligence will be declared non-human.

The Ohio lawmakers are set to pass House Bill 469, which declares that AI cannot be considered among people. This means these tools will be banned from marrying, owning property, or being someone's legal proxy. The law also declares that machines will not take responsibility for any harm caused by artificial intelligence, but humans will have to take it.

Fans took to X to react to the news, with many poking fun at the law. One X user contemplated how fast such technology is progressing that such legislation is required. They wrote:

"How did we get in this situation so quickly..."

Fans shared their thoughts on the matter:

Some other comments about the law were as follows:

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Ohio rep Thad Claggett shares thoughts on new AI law banning them from marrying and owning property

Google AI Mode - Source: Getty

The Ohio bill's sole sponsor and Newark Republican, Thag Claggett, spoke about the new bill concerning artificial intelligence after it was discussed. He explained the purpose of it and said:

"We’re not talking about Optimus walking down the aisle to ‘Here Comes the Bride.’ That’s not what we’re talking about. It is a legal loophole that a system can get embedded into."

Clagget also mentioned that House Bill 469 will stop taking over roles held by spouses, such as making major medical decisions and signing a power of attorney.

"You can get help from many people with those choices. This bill is meant to close legal loopholes that could let companies or bad actors blame their AI programs instead of taking responsibility," he said.

Given that the bill also suggests humans and not machines will be responsible for their deeds, it will also address cases where a person may self-harm or commit suicide after speaking to artificial intelligence.

Earlier this year, 16-year-old Adam Raine committed suicide after having a conversation with ChatGPT. Following his death, his parents, Matt and Maria Raine, filed a lawsuit against ChatGPT, blaming ChatGPT for their son's death. In a lawsuit, Raine named OpenAI founder Sam Altman and claimed:

"ChatGPT actively helped Adam explore suicide methods. Despite acknowledging Adam’s suicide attempt and his statement that he would ‘do it one of these days,’ ChatGPT neither terminated the session nor initiated any emergency protocol."

Alongside the lawsuit, the Raine family also provided Adam's alleged chat logs with ChatGPT. Following the incident, Sam Altman introduced new rules for the bot in October. He wrote on X:

"We made ChatGPT pretty restrictive to make sure we were being careful with mental health issues. We realize this made it less useful/enjoyable to many users who had no mental health problems, but given the seriousness of the issue we wanted to get this right. Now that we have been able to mitigate the serious mental health issues and have new tools, we are going to be able to safely relax the restrictions in most cases."

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With the massive advent of such technology, it remains to be seen how various legal departments adapt to it and make important legislative changes. The Ohio bill has yet to be passed as of this writing, but it could be an important step in that direction.

Edited by Pratyasha Sarkar