will.i.am is "praying for the spirit" of Liam Payne.

The 50-year-old rapper remembered the tragic One Direction star - who died in October 2024 at the age of 31 after falling from the balcony of his Buenos Aires hotel room - and admitted that, along with his former partner Cheryl and their eight-year-old son Bear, Liam is always in his thoughts.

He told The Mirror: "I pray for Cheryl and her kid. I pray for Liam's spirit and his family."

The former Black Eyed Peas star was speaking at the 11th Breakthrough Prize ceremony, where he complained that platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok are "seeded with hate" which means that only the "worst" will be brought out of their users.

He said: "The place that is seeded with the most hate is the algorithm. If the algorithm amplifies hate, that means people are going to be the worst and say the worst. It's what we do on these platforms that scars and is weaponised to bring the worst out of everyone."

The 'Scream and Shout' hitmaker insisted that bosses need to "change the algorithm" in order to implement any kind of positive change, especially amid the rise of artificial intelligence.

He added: "They need to change the algorithm to be more mindful, especially nowadays as AI is growing. Do we want an AI that reflects how inhumane humans are to humans? That would be the worst configuration imaginable."

Will previously warned that AI is an "illusion" that is not going to "express and rinse out emotions" as humans do.

He told The Independent: "We're chasing algorithms… and so I'm here to wave a flag, like, 'Hey, if you're chasing algorithms, you're not going to beat an algorithm'.

"If an AI is going to create and compete to maximise the architecture of algorithms, well, the AI will do that better.

"So in this TikTok race to get views and attention, if that is the spectrum of competition, we lose.

"We need to get back to truly being imaginative, truly rinsing out our emotions, not for algorithmic number counts, but just celebrating expression, and we're not doing that right now.

"And one thing AI is not going to do is express and rinse out emotions. It's not going to love. It gives you the illusion that it does. It could simulate love, but it's not going to love.

"And so people are concerned and worried, but they're forgetting our secret sauce. They're forgetting our humanity and what makes us us.