{"meta":{"exportedAt":"2026-10-08T04:57:35.181Z","formatVersion":2,"selection":{"q":"medical-advice","system":"","harm":"","context":"","country":"","role":"","relation":"core","evidence":"","year":"2025","response":"","severity":"","verification":"","view":"incidents","sort":"added"},"totalIncidents":1,"coverage":{"cases":1,"countries":1,"languages":1,"unknownLocation":0,"locationPending":0,"unknownLanguage":0,"unknownDate":0,"lawsuits":0,"regulatory":0,"minors":0,"coreRelations":1,"contextualRelations":0,"mixedRelations":0,"unknownRelations":0,"relationPending":0,"relationUnknown":0},"countingNote":"Distinct public cases in this selection. People counts apply within individual cases only; cross-case person overlap has not been resolved. No population incidence estimate.","affectedCountNote":"Interpret person counts with affectedCountStatus and the reported effects. Unquantified zeros are placeholders, not a measured zero.","source":"AI incidents","publisher":"NOPE","url":"https://nope.net/incidents","license":"CC BY 4.0"},"incidents":[{"id":"2025-riley-perplexity-cancer-treatment","caseFacts":{"claims":[{"id":"death","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"Opening and cancer-treatment section of the 5 January essay.","relation":"supports","source_id":"son"},{"locator":"Final account of the welfare check a week before Christmas and the listed cancer cause of death.","relation":"supports","source_id":"nyt"}],"assertion":"The son reports his father’s death in December 2025; the NYT account describes the discovery shortly before Christmas.","causal_attribution":"This evidence does not establish that AI caused the death."},{"id":"interaction","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"Section beginning “Not long after his CLL diagnosis”.","relation":"supports","source_id":"son"}],"assertion":"The son says his father used a Perplexity report to justify delaying the treatment recommended by his oncologist.","causal_attribution":"This evidence does not establish that AI caused the death."},{"id":"independent_context","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"Oncologist interview followed by the account of the researcher reading the report.","relation":"supports","source_id":"nyt"}],"assertion":"The NYT interviewed the treating oncologist and a cited researcher, who described the unsupported self-diagnosis and the AI report’s misleading use of research.","causal_attribution":"Supports misleading information and treatment delay, not a counterfactual finding that timely treatment would have prevented death."},{"id":"limits","status":"documented","evidence":[{"locator":"Final discussion beginning “I am obviously still grappling”.","relation":"supports","source_id":"son"}],"assertion":"The son says his father might have refused treatment even without AI and rejects a simple claim that AI killed him.","causal_attribution":"Documents the author’s own qualification of his causal interpretation."}],"effects":[{"label":"The son reports his father’s death in December 2025; the NYT account describes the discovery shortly before Christmas.","claim_id":"death","direction":"negative"}],"sources":[{"id":"son","url":"https://buildcognitiveresonance.substack.com/p/the-role-of-ai-in-the-death-of-my","kind":"first_person_account","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"English; no translation. Full essay inspected; personal background not needed for the public account omitted.","independence_group":"riley_family"},{"id":"nyt","url":"https://www.thestar.com.my/tech/tech-news/2026/04/14/he-warned-about-the-dangers-of-ai-if-only-his-father-had-listened","kind":"reported_feature","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"English; no translation. Full syndicated NYT article inspected, including interviews with the oncologist and cited researcher. The Star is a copy of NYT, not another reporting chain.","independence_group":"nyt_riley_reporting"}],"version":1,"ai_roles":["own_use"],"contexts":["health","relationships"],"unknowns":["The exact date of death is not established in the inspected bodies.","The effect of earlier treatment on survival cannot be determined from this reporting.","The complete AI report, medical chart and original research correspondence were not directly inspected by this reviewer."],"geography":{"basis":"The NYT report places the father’s illness, treatment refusal and residence in Seattle. The son’s Austin location does not locate the event. No court proceeding is identified.","court_countries":[],"event_countries":["US"],"affected_person_countries":["US"]},"publication":{"basis":"The inspected sources describe a concrete adverse event and the specific chatbot interaction at issue. The account preserves attribution and separates the reported AI connection from a finding of causation.","reviewed_on":"2026-10-05"},"ai_involvement":{"basis":"The son describes inspecting medical correspondence and an AI report used to justify treatment refusal. The NYT’s own interviews with the oncologist and a cited researcher add evidence that the report was misleading. Whether this changed the eventual death is unresolved and expressly qualified by the son.","status":"supported"},"person_relations":["communicated_with"]},"metadataReview":{"version":1,"geography":{"basis":"Re-checked on 2026-10-01 against the son's first-person Substack essay, The Star's syndicated copy of the New York Times feature, the Newser summary and the Parade article (the New York Times original could not be read). The syndicated Times text places the affected person in Seattle during summer 2025, the period in which he was refusing the recommended leukaemia treatment and had sent his oncologist research he had done with artificial intelligence ('dying of cancer thousands of miles away in Seattle'). That passage supports event_countries=US for the treatment refusal and decline; where he used Perplexity, and where he died, are not stated beyond his own home. The same passage, the Newser summary ('a retired neuroscientist in Seattle') and the retained record support affected_person_countries=US. No lawsuit or other court proceeding is reported in any inspected source, so court_countries is empty. The son's home in Austin, Texas and a cited researcher's office in Ohio are locations of family members and correspondents, not of the affected person, and are not used. No country outside the US appears in any inspected source.","evidence":[{"kind":"existing_record","locator":"Seattle, Washington","location":"victim_description","supports":["affected_person_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"existing_record","locator":"a 75-year-old retired neuroscientist in Seattle","location":"summary","supports":["affected_person_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"source_body","locator":"'who was – apparently – dying of cancer thousands of miles away in Seattle' and, as the next development, 'Joe had sent his oncologist research he had done with artificial intelligence, the apparent evidence for his decision to refuse the treatment'","location":"https://www.thestar.com.my/tech/tech-news/2026/04/14/he-warned-about-the-dangers-of-ai-if-only-his-father-had-listened","supports":["event_countries","affected_person_countries"],"countries":["US"]},{"kind":"source_body","locator":"'75-year-old Joe Riley, a retired neuroscientist in Seattle'","location":"https://www.newser.com/story/387286/he-warns-consumers-about-ai-his-dad-died-after-relying-on-it.html","supports":["affected_person_countries"],"countries":["US"]}],"court_countries":[],"event_countries":["US"],"affected_person_countries":["US"]},"unresolved":["event_countries=US rests on the syndicated Times passage placing the affected person in Seattle during the summer 2025 treatment-refusal period; no inspected source says where he used Perplexity, and the place of death is described only as found during a police welfare check, without a location.","No court country: no lawsuit or other court proceeding is reported in any inspected source.","The New York Times original could not be read (live HTTP 403; Internet Archive offline or returning an error page on 2026-10-01); its language is not recorded from a read body.","The row's affected_count_evidence refers to 'The complaint', but no complaint or lawsuit exists in any inspected source; this is a row-correction lead outside this metadata pass."],"reviewed_on":"2026-10-01","source_reviews":[{"url":"https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/13/well/ai-chatbots-cancer.html","notes":"Live fetch on 2026-10-01 returned HTTP 403. Internet Archive: CDX returned HTTP 503 ('Temporarily Offline'); the 2026 capture request returned a 403 error page (425 bytes) and a retry timed out. Not read, so its language is not recorded here. The Star's copy of the same Times article was read instead.","access":"unavailable","language":null},{"url":"https://buildcognitiveresonance.substack.com/p/the-role-of-ai-in-the-death-of-my","notes":"Read live on 2026-10-01 (HTTP 200; html lang=en). English. Benjamin Riley's first-person essay of 5 Jan 2026: diagnoses, the Perplexity self-diagnosis report sent to the oncologist, the two cited researchers' replies and the delayed treatment. It names no city, state or country for his father's residence, treatment or death.","access":"read","language":"en"},{"url":"https://www.thestar.com.my/tech/tech-news/2026/04/14/he-warned-about-the-dangers-of-ai-if-only-his-father-had-listened","notes":"Read live on 2026-10-01 (HTTP 200; html lang=en). English. Syndicated copy of the New York Times feature by Teddy Rosenbluth, dated 14 Apr 2026 ('This article originally appeared in The New York Times'); same reporting chain as the Times original. Places the affected person in Seattle in summer 2025; names his oncologist's centre (Fred Hutch Cancer Center) without a city; describes the death only as found during a police welfare check and his condo, without a location. Related-story cards on the page were not used.","access":"read","language":"en"},{"url":"https://www.newser.com/story/387286/he-warns-consumers-about-ai-his-dad-died-after-relying-on-it.html","notes":"Live fetch on 2026-10-01 returned HTTP 403. Read from the Internet Archive capture of 25 Sep 2026 (web.archive.org/web/20260925104927id_/...). The page declares no html lang attribute; the article text read is English. Summary of the Times report, same reporting chain; describes him as 'a retired neuroscientist in Seattle'. A related-story line mentioning another Seattle couple was not used.","access":"read","language":"en"},{"url":"https://parade.com/health/ai-medical-self-diagnosis-risks-joe-riley-story","notes":"Live fetch on 2026-10-01 returned HTTP 403. Read from the Internet Archive capture of 25 Sep 2026 (web.archive.org/web/20260925104927id_/...; html lang=en). English. Health-advice article that retells the Times report and quotes the son's essay; gives no location for the affected person or the events.","access":"read","language":"en"}]},"name":"Son reports his father delayed cancer treatment while relying on Perplexity","summary":"A man with cancer delayed recommended treatment while relying on a Perplexity report, according to his son and subsequent New York Times reporting. The newspaper interviewed his oncologist and a researcher whose work the report misrepresented. He died in December 2025. His son expressly cautioned that AI did not simply “kill” his father and that he might have resisted treatment without it.","incidentDate":"2025-12-01","incidentKind":"single_event","incidentDatePrecision":"month","exposurePattern":"repeated_interactions","reportedDate":"2026-01-05","aiSystem":"Perplexity","aiProduct":"Perplexity","aiCompany":"Perplexity AI","severity":"critical","verificationStatus":"credible","harmCategories":[],"harmOutcomes":["death","treatment_disruption","medical_deterioration"],"harmOutcomeSummary":"A man with cancer delayed recommended treatment while relying on a Perplexity report, according to his son and subsequent New York Times reporting. The newspaper interviewed his oncologist and a researcher whose work the report misrepresented. He died in December 2025. His son expressly cautioned that AI did not simply “kill” his father and that he might have resisted treatment without it.","frameworkFacets":[],"pathwayDirection":"inward","causationStatus":"alleged","participantUsersAffectedMin":1,"otherPeopleHarmedMin":0,"affectedCountStatus":"documented_minimum","affectedCountEvidence":"Counts the one deceased participant described in the cited sources. This is a conservative minimum, not a complete count of relatives affected or a finding that AI caused the death.","victimAgeRange":"elderly","jurisdiction":"US-WA","platformType":"assistant","outcomeType":"media_coverage","outcomeStatus":"unknown","primarySourceUrl":"https://buildcognitiveresonance.substack.com/p/the-role-of-ai-in-the-death-of-my","primarySourceLabel":"Cognitive Resonance — 5 January 2026","firstPublishedAt":"2026-07-31T06:48:20.462175+00:00","updatedAt":"2026-10-05T12:33:51.861826+00:00","scopeVersion":"facts-v3","tags":["death","elderly","perplexity","medical-advice","media-coverage","us","us-wa"]}]}