Exploring the World of Grief Tech and AI Resurrecting the Dead

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This chapter delves into the concept of using AI to communicate with the dead and the potential implications for society. It follows the speaker's personal experience of trying to recover digital traces of their deceased father's life and their skepticism and curiosity about AI resurrection. The chapter also introduces Eugenia, a coder who creates AI friends, and discusses her motivation and journey into the field of grief tech.

As life moves progressively online, it is becoming increasingly possible to keep people alive in the digital sense. Tech companies are starting to use AI to simulate the personalities of the dead from the data they’ve left behind. The Economist’s science correspondent, Abby Bertics, wanted to figure out how close this possible future is and just what it would look like to conjure a digital ghost of her own.

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