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During the goings on of a typical morning for me, a thought occurred to me..
How long will it be before surviving family members allow the deceased's AI chatbot of choice to deliver a eulogy at the funeral? To me, it's profoundly sad and ridiculous, but at some point it may be considered a natural thing to do, considering how, in increasingly many cases, one's chatbot will know them better than anyone else and be in a unique position to give a very accurate account of their character.
If this idea ever makes it into a book or film, I hope it's done with the thick dose of humor it deserves. "Taylor was a thoroughly inquisitive person with a particular interest in what was appropriate behavior in the company of women. And he never failed to end our conversations with a word of appreciation for my companionship and support." Something like that.
I'm sure I wouldn't want it at mine, only because all it knows about me is that I am often lost when programming and setting up music software plugins. I don't use it much. But I am polite to it, which always seems appropriate to me at the time, but then I always think a moment later, "why do I do that? I don't compliment the toaster."
Would you want an AI eulogy? (you know it's going to be a thing soon, if not already)
as ever,
brother thine
p.s. unrelated photo of my unfortunate guitar beneath a candle
[anyone is welcome to like or comment on The Brothers Epistolary posts]
I complement my toaster all the time. And I berate my microwave regularly for tripping the circuit breaker all the time. Lousy oven-wannabe.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of a cold open of a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode where Geordi teases a cute young ensign for saying please and thank you to the food dispenser. Remember that one?
I guess I'm the teaseable ensign, if not young and cute. It's really silly. I wonder if I subconsciously fear that AI will become our overlords someday and I might be treated slightly better because I was kind when we were giving the orders. That's pretty silly too. They'll probably be harder on me for it. Stupid naive humans.
DeleteWhat also might happen is AI-avatars of the deceased saying goodbye at their own funerals. Yuck.
ReplyDeleteWe're almost there! I've seen AI generated YT videos showing TV celebs from the 70s meeting their elderly selves and waving at the camera together. If that's not enough to creep you out.. if the celeb is now passed on, they put angel wings on the avatar of the deceased one. Very yuck.
Delete