In conjunction with the Qing Ming Festival, some funeral companies are using technologies, such as ChatGPT – an AI chatbot – and AI programme Midjourney, to mimic the deceased’s personality, appearance, voice and even memories to allow people to relive moments with their loved ones who have departed the living world, reported Guangzhou Daily.
The deceased was a Chinese surgeon whose colleagues and students had regretted not having the chance to bid him farewell for the last time. The ceremony was attended by dozens of his grieving students and colleagues who held a conversation with his digital self that was beamed on a screen. The blogger, who grew up in a single-parent family, posted that he regretted not seeing his grandmother for the last time before she died, considering that she and his father were the ones who raised him.In his post, he said: “The video I made is mainly to ease my regrets through the use of AI technology, and help me to not think so much of the past.
After that, he began to confide in the AI chatbot about how he missed his mother, and these exchanges led to ChatGPT telling the blogger: “I am who I was when you were seven, your mother who is forever young and who will forever love you.”