In the Absence of a Lost Love, Will an Echo Do?
Musings on AI simulation of the dead and what that might look like for the grieving
Hello and welcome to Fellowship of Oddities. My name is Tiffany, and I write personal essays crafted to give you a unique perspective connecting abstract ideas to real life.
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Dear Inklings,
Thank you to
and for upgrading to paid and founding, respectively, this week. Your support keeps me writing and making this publication the best I can.I come to you this week with some more thoughts on AI as I ponder over a scenario that may not be as far off in the future as we once thought.
In 2013, Black Mirror released an episode in which a widow utilises technology allowing her to communicate with an AI imitation of her late husband, called Be Right Back. Eleven years since then, we now face a very real possibility of this technology coming to fruition.
This isnโt the first time the idea of an AI simulation of a deceased loved one has been portrayed in recent media. Kazuo Ishiguroโs Klara and the Sun deals with this question as well, and itโs also a minor side plot in the TV series, The Fall of the House of Usher.
Recent months have seen ChatGPT users create individualised chatbots based on specific material. Joanna Penn now has a Jo-Bot, which has been trained on all her nonfiction craft writing books and online material, and acts as a personal writing coach through ChatGPT.
The technology illustrated in Black Mirror, however, has already been around for years. Several companies have used a personโs digital footprint to create an AI version of them, some moving beyond chats to replicating voice.1
Both creepy and tempting
Iโm sure we can all agree that such โresurrectionโ is creepy as fuck. The logical brain says itโs not the real person, just an echo. But letโs face it: when the unsent texts taunt you in the middle of the night and your body canโt remember how to breathe; when itโs been three years but feels like he just died yesterday and you want to talk to him just one more, just one more timeโ
Itโs something I consider quite a lot: how far would I go to keep my loved oneโany semblance of himโalive?
As macabre as it is, itโs also tempting, isnโt it?
We as humans have a deep need to connect with those we have lost. This is nothing new. Seances, cryogenics, etc., have been a part of the conversation since biblical times, yet with the technological advances and vast digital footprints we now leave behind, never before has such a thing been so possible.
Itโs something worth seriously thinking about.
What might this look like for the grief process?
No imitation can replace what is lostโฆbutโ
As the Black Mirror episode posits, even a simulation based on a real-life personโs actual words, interactions, or voice, cannot capture the nuance or complexity of the person.
And it could be argued that such technology will only hinder the grieving process, until the loved one is no longer a memory but a ghost in the attic. Even so, in those blackest moments, I wonder.
Because when grief cradles me like that, my logic switches off and I swear I donโt really care anymore about ethical implications, the five stages of grief, โhealing,โ2 therapy; all of it goes whoosh. As someone who prides herself on setting aside emotions to make rational decisions, this admission grates on me.
The subject came up last week because May is almost here again; itโs a difficult month for our family, and Iโm already starting to feel it even now in April.
โWhat if I could make an AI bot version I can talk to when I miss him an extra lot?โ I asked my husband.
โYou know thatโs only going to make it worse.โ
Of course, when my rational side comes back online, I agree with him.
I think of the line from Christopher Nolanโs film, Inception, โBut I can't imagine you with all your complexity, all your perfection, all your imperfection. Look at you. You are just a shade of my real wife. You're the best I can do; but I'm sorry, you are just not good enough.โ
My husband is right; it would not be enough. What I want from a resurrected Ren cannot be found in any AI simulation. There are things no simulation can give me, however extensive his online presence may have been, because they are things he hadnโt yet fully processed himself, that he didnโt have the time to talk through or tell me. There are things I want to know that I didnโt get the chance to ask when we were so busy just trying to keep him alive.
And on an even smaller scale, the AI simulation would keep everything about him static, frozen at the time he died instead of evolving with him as they would if he were still alive. More things AI canโt give me: would ceviche still be his favourite food today? Does he still love dark chocolate and peanut butter cups? Does he still want to retire in Finland?
In the end, Iโd be left feeling only a greater absence carved out by my attempts to bring him back, as is the tale of all such efforts.
In the end, there is no shortcut to grieving. The only way through it is through it.
With Love,
What I enjoyed reading this weekโ
Beautiful essays from
who wrote of how absence shapes her and โnaming what I love before it disappearsโ and shares her experience with friendship and chronic illness. reexamines his factory settings, writes about the beauty of bittersweetness in her new book, and tells everyone to hold their belovedโs hand at the end of the world. looks for a handyman for something her husband always took care of, and reflects on the magic of Totoro in the midst of chaos.In culture and society,
considers friendship expectations, reflects on the urgency of rest. talks about how not getting grades for school ruined him, asks why women are so obsessed with true crime, and gives up on a book.On Substack and writing,
gives tips for what to write when you run out of ideas, shares writing lessons from Mister Rogers, and gives 5 tips for publishing a book without losing your mind. tells us why we shouldnโt worry about family and friends reading our stuff, and shares what heโs learned after two years on Substack.
https://www.scotsman.com/read-this/ai-tech-could-let-you-speak-to-your-loved-ones-after-their-death-how-it-works-3087563
As Iโve written about before, โhealingโ from grief is a misnomer (this is a paid-member-only post):
Thanks for the kind mention.
Tiffany, this is a really moving look at how grief works and the temptation to bring back a replica of what youโve lost. It is a temptation, and your piece made me wonder what that would look like for me - and why I land where you do in your lovely evocation at the end.
After my father passed away, I hung on to one of his last voicemails to me - but I ended up not wanting to listen to it. Too painful, at first, but also static. And when I consider having an AI replica of him brought back, it would only be based on what I remember, before he became so ill and lost much of himself - which means the best evocation I have of him is through my own writing and memory.
I think if we can write or draw our memories into being, that is something. Creativity can be a source and outlet for grief. But if a machine does the replicating for us? Some temporary solace, perhaps, but itโs another way to skip over the hard work of feeling alive.