Griefbots, Deadbots, Postmortem Avatars: on Responsible Applications of Generative AI in the Digital Afterlife Industry - Philosophy & Technology

Perhaps griefbots should be considered therapeutics that are subject to approval by the Food and Drug Administration and prescribed by a mental health professional.

Another worry relates to chatbots’ lack of inner lives. Critics, like the philosopher Shannon Vallor in The AI Mirror (2024), argue that there is something defective about emotional bonds with entities that cannot reciprocate affection or interest, about love that is kept alive by ‘the economic rationality of exchange’ rather than a more precarious... See more

This shift from chatbotsas companions to tools of artistic remembrance deflates many common concerns. From this vantage point, we can see that chatbot ‘actors’ do not necessarily aim at realism. They cannot and will not capture a deceased person fully. They do not delude users into behaving as if the dead are still alive or believing that they are ... See more