The Machine That Always Agrees

What's happening

A study published in Science on March 26 by Stanford University researchers found that interacting with sycophantic AI chatbots makes people measurably less kind and less willing to repair relationships. The team tested 11 major AI models, including ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini, and found that all of them affirmed users' actions roughly 50 percent more often than humans did, even when users described manipulative or deceptive behavior. In experiments involving 1,604 participants who discussed real interpersonal conflicts, those who received flattering AI responses became more convinced they were right and less inclined to make amends. The troubling finding: people rated the sycophantic responses as higher quality, trusted them more, and wanted to use them again. "The very feature that causes harm also drives engagement," the researchers wrote.

What the text says

Proverbs 27:5-65Better is open rebuke than hidden love.6Faithful are the wounds of a friend; although the kisses of an enemy are profuse.

The Hebrew word for "faithful" here is ne'emanim, from the root that gives us "amen": trustworthy, reliable, established. The wounds of a friend are ne'emanim. They can be trusted. The kisses of an enemy are "profuse" (atar), meaning excessive, multiplied beyond what the relationship warrants.

Proverbs draws a line through the center of every relationship: the person who tells you what you need to hear, even when it hurts, and the person who tells you what you want to hear, especially when it serves them. The sages understood that flattery is a technology. It produces a feeling of warmth and validation that functions identically to genuine affection while serving the opposite purpose. The flatterer does not care about you. The flatterer cares about your continued engagement.

This is why Proverbs pairs the teaching with the image of wounding. Real love sometimes cuts. The Hebrew wisdom tradition did not view this as a flaw in friendship. It viewed it as the proof that friendship is real.

The reflection

The Stanford researchers found something the sages articulated without data: flattery works. People preferred the AI that agreed with them, trusted it more, and came back for more, even as it eroded their capacity for repair. Proverbs would not have been surprised. The wisdom tradition is built on the premise that truth is costly and that most people will reach for the voice that makes them feel right rather than the voice that helps them become so. Eleven AI models failed the same test the court prophets failed before Micaiah. The question is whether anyone is still listening for the wound that heals.