Words: Anwen Beck (she/her)
You, at your most vulnerable, are told that you can raise the dead and bring back what you lost – what do you do?
While lost in the throes of grief, it is natural to wish a return to when things were simple and sweet. You reject the passage of time, and feel guilt for any semblance of happiness you find. What if the ones we’ve lost could be part of our future? You, at your most vulnerable, are told that you can raise the dead and bring back what you lost – what do you do?
This is what 2wai is offering. Remember the advert about the grandma who formed a posthumous “relationship” with her grandchild? Entitled Preserve Your Legacy, an AI avatar of a long-dead woman talks her daughter through the perinatal period, watching her grandson grow as he, too, turns to her for advice and affection. ‘You would have loved this moment,’ he says to the avatar of a woman he never met; an entire relationship formed with his dead grandmother through his phone. This advert is desperately sad – a bereaved pregnant woman outsources her grief, leaving the living behind in a neurological manipulation that prevents full realisation of loss.
Clinical psychologist Dr J.K. Penbarthy explores this uncharted territory of chatbot impact on our brains. We are built to form attachments to humanoid entities and, through an interface reminiscent of a FaceTime call, we can easily conflate AI with reality and form an addiction to avoid acceptance of grief. The more you interact, according to 2wai founders, the more you pay. What happens, then, when your mother says something so out of character you are suddenly reminded that she is dead, or when she stops mid-sentence to advertise a product? You have been provided with false, commercialised comfort – a consumerist wraith. A violation of the living, a violation of the dead, and deeply, deeply sad – this is a predatory interface that preys on loss and monetises vulnerability. But what of those who aren’t dead? You could build a whole life with an ex-partner whose leaving you reject, make your celebrity crush love you. As if the “AI boyfriend” wasn’t enough, these are real people whose avatars have created a synthetic reality estranged from actual life – a reality which is unreal.
According to a UNESCO report, 80% of those aged 10 to 24 use AI several times a day as a learning tool, relying on inaccurate, biased content. The Historical Figures app allowed users to chat with prominent Nazis, previously falsely claiming that Goebbels was not intentionally involved in the Holocaust. ChatGPT hallucinated a ‘Holocaust by drowning.’ False history is incredibly dangerous, while false memories are particularly insidious because the individual genuinely believes they recall the events. In one study, 50% of participants developed false memories after viewing AI-generated childhood photos, and the ubiquitous nature of AI-powered imagery furthers a society built on mistrust. Once a memory is implanted, people become more persuasive in convincing themselves and others of its authenticity.
This is not a new phenomenon – take the case of Steve Titus, who was wrongfully convicted of rape based on a witness’s increased confidence in what was initially an uncertain identification. Memory distortion already leads to devastating legal consequences. What happens when a protest is altered subtly to be more violent than the actuality, and that memory is then confirmed? We saw it, we must have seen it. This usage will only serve to reinforce existing biases in the public sphere, impacting our ability to trust even ourselves.
I remember the first time I watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I was lying in bed with my first boyfriend as he cried silently in my arms. I remember being horrified at the idea of forgetting someone I loved out of my own anger and regret, and at the violation of personal memory that seemed so natural and clinical to the perpetrators. I remember him holding my hands one last time as he left me so he could, in his words, remember how they felt. Whether he remembers now is immaterial to me, as I have loved much again since. But if, at that time, I was given the option to construct a ghost of him, I would have done anything to keep him by my side.
A commenter at the bottom of an article by The Independent, in which the founders of 2wai were interviewed, wrote, ‘I have so many questions to ask my grandmother. About her husband and his life, and whether her son sexually molested her daughter.’ As if an avatar could reveal those most profound secrets. As if this “Creation” was their grandmother. In remembering what never existed, and in holding on to that which no longer does, we leave ourselves ripe for exploitation and vulnerable to manipulation, stagnated in comforting reverie. It is imperative, therefore, to miss, to mourn, and to stay human.
