(UnitedVoice.com) – Losing someone you love is a terrible experience, and the mourning process can be long and brutal. Many people would give anything to feel connected to their lost loved one again. Strides in artificial intelligence (AI) are giving some people that chance.
Mourning Chinese citizens are turning to AI tech firms to create digital avatars to remember the person they lost. The company Super Brain charges people between 10,000 ($1,400) and 20,000 yuan ($2,800) to create a basic avatar. The company takes approximately 20 days to complete the project.
Seakoo Wu lost his son, Xuanmo, in 2022 while he was attending Exeter University in the United Kingdom. The 22-year-old was an only child and was in Britain studying finance and accounting. Wu told Barrons that he and his wife donated their child’s organs after he died. He explained that Xuanmo “always carried in him [a] desire to help people,” and that’s what he did in death.
After his son died, Wu began researching ways to bring his son back to life — digitally. He spent thousands of dollars paying firms to clone his son’s voice and face. To do it, he provided the companies with videos, photos, and audio recordings of Xuanmo’s voice. At one point, Xu partnered with Super Brain, as well.
Wu has also started work to create a database that includes an incredible amount of information about his late son. He wants to eventually feed the database into an algorithm that will create an avatar that will copy his son’s speech patterns and even his thinking.
Super Brain Founder Zhang Zewei explained why the technology is so popular. He said the “digital version of someone (can) exist forever, even after their body has been lost.”
For people who are mourning the loss of a child or someone else, the AI version of that person might be just what they need to help them make it through that difficult time.
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