In 1966, a simple script convinced people a computer understood them
MIT computer scientist Joseph Weizenbaum built ELIZA, a program that just reflected users' own statements back as questions through pattern matching, to mimic a psychotherapist. He was unsettled when people, including his own secretary, treated it as genuinely empathetic and asked him to leave the room for privacy. The reflex to read real understanding into a scripted program is now called the 'ELIZA effect.'