American and South Korean companies are developing artificial intelligence to chat with deceased relatives. For now, it’s still a niche market, but these technologies raise many questions, including ethical ones.
These are voices from beyond the grave thanks to artificial intelligence. Many applications now make it possible to “talk” with missing persons. A particular concept, even disturbing, which nevertheless takes more and more scale. For six years, in the United States, it has been possible to “chat” on a messaging system with a loved one who has disappeared. Since then, other technologies have arrived and now there is sound and video. The South Korean company Deepbrain has made it one of its specialties with its “re;memory” project.
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In the presentation video, we see Mr. Lee, who died several months ago, on a big screen. His wife and daughter speak with him, or rather with a very powerful artificial intelligence capable of reproducing the faces, voices and facial expressions of missing persons.
To work, these technologies do not start from scratch. They need to collect as much data as possible during our lifetime: SMS, videos, photos, writings, but also our interests, our tastes, our habits, our purchases… So much information which is then compiled to generate an “avatar “as faithful as possible.
Ethical issues
Some companies want to go even further than video, with three dimensions and touch. The American company Somnium Space will offer by the end of the year to create our avatar in a digital world thanks to the “life forever” mode. Our loved ones will then be able to wear a virtual reality headset and a haptic suit to receive electrical signals comparable to human touch.
But all this is not without raising ethical and psychological questions. Laurence Devillers is a professor of artificial intelligence at Sorbonne University, a researcher at the CNRS and a member of the National Pilot Committee for Digital Ethics (CNPEN): “We can imagine anything! We can make a missing person age, see what they would have become. How far are we going to stop?”
For many psychologists and psychiatrists, such as Dr. Christophe Fauré, specialist in the issue of bereavement, this technology will inevitably have consequences: “All of these technologies clearly go against the natural process of grieving after the loss of a loved one.
A niche sector
Especially since all these applications are very recent and no one has been able to study their impact. Martin Julier Costes is a researcher in the sociology and anthropology of mourning and death: “I don’t think we have enough hindsight to say whether these technologies are harmful or particularly positive. It’s probably both.”
For this researcher, it is therefore a tool like any other, and for some people, dialogue with the dead in a digital world can make sense. It remains to be seen whether these artificial intelligences will find their audience. Nothing is less certain, because some designers themselves are skeptical. Joseph Murphy is responsible for the development of the South Korean company Deepbrain: “So far we have launched less than ten ‘re;memory’ projects. We consider that this is a niche sector and that it is not really a developing market”.
Moreover, the American giant Microsoft obtained a patent three years ago to develop this type of technology, and has not yet developed anything.