AI Project That Allows People To "Connect With Dead" Concerns Experts

MIT professor Sherry Turkle describes this pursuit as a deeply human desire, rooted in history and evolving with technology.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has become an integral part of everyday life, enabling activities that were previously impossible with older technology. For instance, people can now use AI to create animated videos from old family photos and craft stories from them. 

According to a new report by The Metro, now it's the turn of researchers and technologists to explore new ways to communicate with the dead with the help of artificial intelligence. For Sherry Turkle, an MIT professor and long-term observer of the human relationship with technology, the impetus to communicate with the dead is deeply human. It moves across history, from seances and Ouija boards to the technological innovations of the modern day, just at the bleeding edge of new advances in AI. Even Thomas Edison himself had considered creating a "spirit phone".

That quest for connection has just taken an interesting turn with the announcement of Apple Intelligence by Apple CEO Tim Cook. According to Turkle, AI is going to be buried in everyday life much faster than social media was, if not more. Coupled with money at stake, she warns that these emotional risks may ensue even faster when it comes to the rapid integration and allurement of new technology, as explored in her documentary Eternal You.