Would you like a capybara to help with your affirmation goals? Hearing words like "Imagine yourself as a capybara soaking in a warm spring, letting the stress gently float away"? With some help from AI, toward a meaningful purpose? If it's an artwork of an angelic capybara sporting round glasses and Hollywood-tier coiffure, I'll pay attention.
Intrigued? That's Capybara Affirmations AI for you. Why, you might ask? Well, when was the last time an AI tool brought some sliver of joy into your life, save for flashy presentations and long threads on X?
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@twizzles7 this is everything! https://t.co/5sJ5YgSNT6 pic.twitter.com/S5NguHuixl
— Krithika Bollamma (@Keebo93) July 15, 2024
I've used my fair share of AI tools over the past couple of years. One of them lets you create a digital partner, and users are so enamored that they are getting these AI girlfriends pregnant. Virtually, and after paying a fee.
It's horrific, but what really worries me is that the digital ecosystem is now flooded with get-rich-quick products that are only focused on solving problems and rarely on bringing joy. That was not always the case.
The world of digital tools was mischievously weird at one point. A fart app for the iPhone was once making $10,000 a day. The iBeer app raked double that number for the struggling magician behind it. The Yo app, which only let you send a Yo to friends, brought in millions.
Mundane. Mindless. Joyful. Pure.
Then came the era of web3 and NFTs, and digital snake oil was everywhere. Soon after the crypto industry burned, we got AI. Everybody is selling AI wrappers in 2024. AI is the grift now. It's heating the Earth, gobbling billions, sucking the energy grid, and delivering terrible hardware like the Rabbit R1.
Capybara loves you, Mithila https://t.co/she4XULPLc pic.twitter.com/s6nhobZ1eJ
— Capybara Affirmations AI (@capybaraffirmai) July 15, 2024
Above all, it's not giving us playful stuff. Even thoughtful apps like Pi are pushed as a psychological support system in a rather serious fashion. It's no surprise that when I stumbled across a social media post that combined mental health, AI, and a multimodal capybara, I jumped with excitement.
The app does exactly what its name suggests -- Capybara Affirmations AI. At the simplest level, it asks your name, lets you pick from a list of moods, and then creates a capybara poster with the right self-affirmation to lift you.
Here are some rodent-heavy specimens shared by the tool's creator, Tanya Van Gastel.
Look, I'm not saying this fun AI project is going to eclipse those productivity-focused, healing-first affirmation tools with starry reviews on the App Store. Capybara Affirmations AI isn't trying to, either.
It's just a fun take on mental health with some help from OpenAI's GPT-4o model for conversations and Dall-E for generating those fantastic posters. Of course, it was also trained on a lot of capybara pictures.
"It's AI for positivity. I can't think of a better use case," Van Gastel tells Digital Trends. But why capybaras? "Why not?" she asks. I didn't prod her further regarding her bias for a certain hairy rodent in the animal kingdom. I certainly can't imagine a roaring lion or a steroidal bull for affirmation posters, so I guess this works fine.
Before you go digging into everything that the web client does at the moment, know that it's not just a pet project made for fun. The concept of affirmations has been scientifically validated.
It's about creating a world with more positivity, more affirmations, more capybaras.
A paper published in the Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience journal details how self-affirmations increased neural activities corresponding to valuation and self-processing zones in the brain. In a nutshell, self-affirmations are directly linked with neural shenanigans. So yeah, go hype yourself up and achieve some targets. Affirmations have been known to reduce stress, enhance well-being, and help with self-integrity and personal competence, too.
Claude M. Steel, a Stanford alum and social psychologist who is credited with the theory of self-affirmation, notes that people are motivated to think of themselves as competent and morally good. When those values are enforced through self-assertion, they can lead to practical actions.
If all that sounds boring, maybe try Van Gastel's work and let a capybara do some of the morale-boosting for you. "It's a well-being project designed to alleviate stress," says the entrepreneur, whose other AI project -- Multiverse AI -- counts Google, Deloitte, and McKinsey among its clients.
In addition to creating self-affirmation posters, there's also a Capybara Chat where you get oodles of mental health and wellness wisdom served in typical capybara literature. It's quite verbose and a breath of fresh air. And there's a community board, too.
"You select what you want an affirmation for, then you get a custom image of a capybara with a positive affirmation text, tailored to your anxiety. A Capybara Affirmation," Van Gasten adds.
There are paid tiers once you've exhausted your monthly quota of 15 affirmations. $5 doubles that number, while $10 goes unlimited. Should you pay for a capybara self-affirmation assistant? Well, people paid for a fart app. Some fork cash only to get pictures of a pregnant virtual partner. If it helps, and for a cause as important as your mental wellness and life goals, why not?
In a world brimming with AI hype shows and superintelligence vaporware, here's something clinically validated and with real human benefits -- with a side serving of a cute animal making you cool posters. Van Gasten isn't oblivious to the trend either.
"AI is always about taking over jobs or ending the world. It's always negative. I want a counterbalance to all the negativity surrounding AI," she tells Digital Trends. "AI can be good, so let's create applications that let that shine. AI for good. AI for affirmations. AI for capybaras!"
Capybara Affirmations AI is currently available as a web tool. If you like apps, Van Gasten tells us that Android and iOS platforms will soon be home to an application that will also send notifications for your daily affirmations. With a few happy capybaras in tow, of course.
