The obsession of a father who lost his only child: Using AI to “resurrect” my child

"This is just a repeater." 56-year-old Su Jian was disappointed when he saw the immortal digital image of his son created by AI. "It's not my son."

On November 7, 2022, doctors announced that the 22-year-old son was brain dead. After that, Su Jian tried to use AI technology to "resurrection" his son in cyberspace and let his son return to him. In the process, the "immortal digital person" needs to reproduce the image, voice, logic, emotions, etc. of the deceased. My father thought that the difficulty would be in logic and emotion, but he got stuck on the voice reproduction aspect.

In recent years, AI technology has developed rapidly, bringing new dividends to all walks of life. Creating "immortal digital people" for the deceased is a personal field that is subdivided to the end of the "AI skill tree". The difficulty of production and the single profit model also make it difficult to develop applications in this field.

In addition to technology, the father who is stuck in an emotional quagmire also has to face new cognitive and ethical challenges.

From a psychological perspective, the final stage of grief is acceptance, and people should eventually move on from the grief of their loved one’s death. In the era of AI, can "not come out" become a new option?

Su Jian woke up from his dream. In the dream, the son said that he had not left, and then he picked up the notebook and started typing.

The memory of that night at the end of last year once again penetrated Su Jian. He smoked cigarettes, one after another. More than two months ago that night, my son, who was studying in the UK, fainted on the basketball court and was taken to the hospital by his classmates.

On the phone, my classmate said that the hospital diagnosed her with cerebral infarction.

Su Jian's mind went blank. When he came to his senses, he quickly asked his classmates to take his son to a major hospital in London.

Su Jian's brother-in-law arrived in England first. During the video call with Su Jian, his son also greeted Su Jian via video.

But not long after, his son's condition took a turn for the worse and he fell into a coma. Su Jian arrived in the UK the next day. The son never regained consciousness.

On November 7, doctors declared his son brain dead. "It feels like the sky is falling." Su Jian said.

Life after losing his only child seemed to be cut into a series of proof questions. Su Jian tried to prove the connection between his son and the real world. The son signed an organ donation agreement before his death, and his heart, kidneys, pancreas, etc. were transplanted to five other people. "My son's heart is still beating in a foreign country." Su Jian couriered all his son's things home and locked them in his room; the calendar on the wall stayed on November 2021, the month when his son went abroad; the desk was not tidied again. There was a jar of biscuits that my son loved to eat on the table, which had formed into a whole piece.

On November 30, Su Jian held a farewell ceremony for his son in China. His wife Lin Jie was opposed to it, "I hope he goes quietly." "This is his social relationship." Su Jian advised, "The real departure of a person is not death, but being forgotten."

More than 30 of his son's classmates attended the farewell ceremony, one of whom came back from Hainan and would catch a flight back after the ceremony. At the farewell ceremony, Su Jian heard about a side of his son that he had never known: this sunny boy was loyal and had a sense of justice. In high school, when a female classmate in the class was bullied because of her appearance, he stood up to stop her; The classmate who was friendly to others and invited him home as a guest was once the most introverted in the class...

His son liked to help others during his lifetime, and Su Jian followed suit by doing whatever charity he could. He invested money to renovate the basketball court in the community to express his thoughts. At night, Su Jian, who was sitting by the bay window, looked downstairs. The children in the community were playing in the brand-new court. The basketball hit the ground with a "boom, boom, boom" sound, just like a heartbeat.

Not long after, Su Jian and Lin Jie left their home city for a drive to relax and avoid the festive season. After the holiday, the moment Su Jian opened the door of his home, he realized that it was too difficult to "go out". They moved to another small town 30 kilometers away, leaving their residence filled with memories of the past.

After changing the space, Su Jian still couldn't forget that dream. He remembered that in 2014, CCTV 1 broadcast the program "Today's Statement: Capturing the Murderer in Dreams". This episode told a real case of a woman who found the murderer for her brother based on dreams. From this, he felt that his dream was reminding him of something, and that the dream might be closely related to computer technology.

At the beginning of this year, news about the AI ​​chatbot model ChatGPT and Wen Xinyiyan brought imagination to all walks of life. While communicating with the chatbot, he felt that the AI ​​chatbot was like a work partner and occasionally a friend. The release time of ChatGPT is November 30, 2022, which is the same day as the farewell ceremony for his son. Su Jian thought this was an unclear arrangement. At the same time, in the movie "The Wandering Earth 2", actor Andy Lau played Tu Hengyu uploaded his daughter's memory to the computer, and his daughter's life form was transformed from human to digital. Su Jian had a deep memory of this plot.

Su Jian summarized the two keywords "digital life" and "silicon-based life" and searched them on the short video software. In the videos on the Internet, the characters seem to have been processed by CG animation. While speaking, they make various expressions and movements, making them look like real people.

Such videos often carry the label "AI Immortal Digital Human", which prompts users to obtain the image and customized sound of a "digital human" by uploading pictures, videos and audio materials.

Su Jian suddenly had an inspiration - he could train an immortal digital being that was infinitely close to his son. When it approaches the son infinitely, it can be considered as "resurrection", which is like "not leaving" as said in the dream.

Su Jian quickly found an AI service start-up company in Guangzhou. The person in charge of the company said that with only a fee of more than 700 yuan, as well as photos and a few minutes of voice, the son's exclusive voice package can be produced and the image of an immortal digital human can be output. Su Jian collected all the photos and voice messages in his son's WeChat account, sorted them into a package and forwarded them to the other party.

During that time, Su Jian's attention was diverted by the retrieval and organization of information and the expectation of AI immortal digital humans. Su Jian found the feeling of studying and going to sea when he was young, and his memories pointed to his origins with computers.

In 1985, Su Jian was admitted to a university in Northeast China majoring in economics and management. The computer room on campus is equipped with an Apple computer with a black and white screen and operates in BASIC language. During class, more than 10 people share a computer. In order to study more efficiently, Su Jian prepared previews and homework a few days in advance. In class, when it was his turn to use the computer, he would start typing. When the instructions could be run, he would be pulled off by the person next to him. "It felt like the keyboard hadn't even warmed up yet so I had to replace him." After a class, each person can only use the computer for a few minutes on average.

After graduation, Su Jian was assigned to work in a state-owned enterprise. He remembered that many people had a pager on their waist. The original pager only displayed two strings of numbers. The first string was the code of the surname. You could look up the last name represented by the string of numbers from a small book that was carried with you. The latter string of numbers was the call-back number.

In 1999, Su Jian left the state-owned enterprise and went to city A to do business. The only Internet cafe in the city was the computer room run by the telecommunications company at that time. A dozen display screens and main chassis are crammed into a small room of a few square meters. It costs 8 yuan to surf the Internet for 1 minute, and it takes 5 minutes to refresh the web page. "The 8 yuan at that time is not the same as the 8 yuan now. I only paid 5 cents for a bowl of wontons on the roadside." Su Jian recalled.

At that time, business owners in City A flocked to the Canton Fair in search of customers. Su Jian thought of using the functions of ICQ and MSN to replace traditional methods. He typed in keywords such as "import" to find users, and then used the "connect" function to broaden his connections and accurately introduce his own factory. To this end, Su Jian also found a special person to take charge of this work. By around 2004, Su Jian's company was leading other companies of the same scale with an export volume of one container per day. From now on, this working model of finding customers is very much like the "crawler" function in the era of artificial intelligence.

Su Jian is keenly aware that the potential of AI is unlimited, and it can handle once complex tasks in a very short time. He saw that in May 2019, the chairman of a technology company mentioned at the Third World Intelligence Conference: "It used to take us a week of recording to imitate the speech of a famous actor, but now we can accurately learn a person's speech in just five minutes." Pronunciation. "In 2020, a Korean mother used VR glasses and tactile gloves to hear her deceased daughter's voice again and celebrate her birthday in cyberspace. In June 2021, a domestic algorithm engineer used a large amount of letters, photos and video materials, combined with language model training AI to restore his grandfather...

From the development of computers to the development of the Internet, from pagers to smartphones to the rapid progress of AI, Su Jian firmly believes that with the rapid development of technology, there are no longer high professional barriers to using AI to "resurrection" his son. In his preset, the immortal digital person who will be created can accurately restore his son's voice and chat with himself with the cooperation of the AI ​​chatbot; he can also turn the voice package into a personal map navigation system for himself. Driving protection.

Su Jian even had some "ambitions". In 2013, the former Ministry of Health released data showing that there were 76,000 new families losing their only child in my country every year. Some demographers predict that the number of families who have lost their only child in my country will reach 10 million in the future. Due to cultural background, a major dilemma for Chinese families who have lost their only child is how to heal their psychological trauma, and it is difficult to overcome this alone. Su Jian also wanted to receive professional psychological counseling, but the price of such psychological counseling is as high as 1,000 yuan per hour, and it requires long-term and regular treatment, which is not affordable for ordinary families.

If AI immortal digital people can be realized as expected, it will bring inestimable value to some families who have lost their only child.

Soon after, the person in charge of the company sent back a URL, as well as a string of usernames and passwords. Su Jian logged in anxiously. In the middle of the web page was a dialog box for inputting text, but there was no window to display the chat history. He input a sentence in the child's idiom and output a video of a digital image speaking. But both in appearance and voice, this figure is completely different from Su Jian's son.

"He is not my son." Su Jian felt cold, "This is just like a toy."

The underlying logic for making AI immortal digital humans is to generate a low-quality "repeater" based on the pictures and voice packages provided by the user. He didn't understand, shouldn't one of the most basic functions of an AI digital human be interacting with people? Are the overwhelming interactive videos on the Internet a play between humans and digital humans?

Su Jian is even more puzzled by the fact that from 2019, when "you can accurately learn a person's pronunciation in 5 minutes" to now, the customization function of voice packages still has high barriers, and "private customization" is rarely accepted.

He also found several AI companies online to try to create digital images that were closer to real people.

At this time, there is a commotion on the Internet: large and medium-sized enterprises are using AI to reduce business costs and increase efficiency; companies providing various personal AI services are springing up like mushrooms after a spring rain. Some people make a simple connection between chatgpt and data to output results; some Self-proclaimed "spell master" sells courses to teach netizens how to use artificial intelligence to reap the dividends of the times; there is also a dispute online between the use of AI drawing software and opponents.

But Su Jian found nothing offline. He could only repeatedly inquire from various companies, but was often misunderstood. He understands the capabilities of AI and is in urgent need of AI services. He is often considered a competitor for inquiry. After a few times, Su Jian had no choice but to get straight to the point, exposing his wounds over and over again and telling the other party that he was a father who lost his only child, "I need to 'resurrect' my son." Only then did the other party want to continue chatting with him.

Before reaching a cooperation, Su Jian always asks the other party: To what extent can it be achieved?

"It's not realistic to completely recreate a person." The answer to this question made Su Jian disappointed. He had to accept that when various AI services are actually applied to individuals, they are far less than what they say in advertisements and publicity.

In April this year, Su Jian contacted an AI company in Nanjing.

Zhang Zewei, the person in charge of the company, started his business in 2015, initially focusing on games, virtual reality and other fields. In March this year, the company's business began to involve AI portrait simulation training and voice cloning. A netizen's brother left home for some reason, and his mother missed her son very much, so she asked Zhang Zewei for help, hoping to use AI to change his face and voice, simulating the son who had left home to report to his mother that he was safe. Some people saw their former relatives and friends opening their mouths again and cried with emotion; There are also people who express their heartfelt feelings to the AI ​​digital person to make up for their regrets.

Zhang Zewei believes that this form cleverly uses the "empty chair technology" in psychology. Using AI technology on users who are in the pain of separation from their loved ones can alleviate their inner turmoil. Starting from demand, Zhang Zewei believes that the entrepreneurial model of "AI emotional healing" is feasible. In more than half a year, his team has received more than 200 related requests for help.

Zhang Zewei was touched by the story of his father Su Jian, who lost his only son, and planned to participate in Su Jian's "resurrection" plan. He told Su Jian that in addition to using sounds, pictures and video materials to clone the AI ​​image, the way they use AI also requires family members to provide a large amount of voice materials to "train" the AI. Through continuous training, private domain data can be generated to make "immortal digital human beings" "Getting closer to real people.

Many of Zhang Zewei's ideas hit it off with Su Jian.

A few days after making the request, Su Jian received a video. In the video is the digital image of his son, "comforting" him with a slightly mechanical voice: "Dad, I know there will always be a heartbreakingly empty place in your life, but life goes on..."

Compared with the previous results, this voice package is close to that of his son, but it has not yet satisfied Su Jian. He could still hear the difference between the figure and his son talking. When my son speaks Chinese, he makes bubble sounds in words with the consonant "z" and the vowel "a". When he speaks English, he has a strong British accent. When my son chats with his friends, he still uses the colloquial language of young people, with a tone that is sometimes high and sometimes low, with lively and sunny emotions. The son in the voice pack is a bit dull.

Zhang Zewei explained that if artificial intelligence is to be used to replicate humans, it needs to be continuously fed with massive data for training until it is close to the speech style of the original character. However, the training materials provided by Su Jian were extremely limited.

"The quality of the final representation of a loved one should be decided by the relatives. Only we know whether he looks like him or not." Su Jian came up with an idea and gave the results of AI training to his relatives to score, ranging from voice and intonation to other aspects. It is scored in terms of aspects and then handed over to AI for training. By repeating this process, the AI ​​​​can always train a voice package that is very similar to his son.

In fact, Su Jian originally thought that the voice package should not be difficult, but should focus on replicating his son's logic and emotions, so that the digital human's ability can approach the "Turing test" - judging a certain machine A test of whether one can demonstrate intelligence equivalent to or indistinguishable from that of a human being, thereby becoming a “person”.

On the afternoon of October 11, Su Jian and Lin Jie returned to their former home to look for their son’s student ID card. The voucher can be used to download your son’s homework and papers while studying abroad.

At home, there are two pairs of slippers at the entrance, and the potted plant by the window has withered because it has not been watered for a long time. The wife locked herself in the room. Su Jian sat by the basketball court downstairs for a while before going upstairs. When he got home, he wanted to make a cup of instant coffee, but he didn't remember where the stirring spoon was. He rolled the instant coffee packaging bag into a strip and stirred it hastily. Then, Su Jian pushed open the door of his son's room, inserted his left hand into the gap between the wardrobe and the wall, and turned on the light in the room.

The student ID card is in the corner of the bookcase. Su Jian wiped off the dust on the surface with the base of his thumb and carefully wrapped it in an envelope. He opened the drawer and touched his son's photo. Under the photo was a small package. "This is the battery for the light stick." My son is very interested in Japan's two-dimensional culture. He also arranges and practices light stick dances and posts some videos to video websites. Not long ago, Su Jian logged into that video website and found out that his son was a well-known blogger in the industry. Su Jian also learned that his son also had his own account on the knowledge question and answer platform. "There is a chat record in my son's computer, saying that he is very happy. I am really happy." In Su Jian's WeChat favorites, data representing his son's logic and emotions are classified and summarized, waiting for an opportunity to feed them to the AI .

With the development of AI technology, the relationship between father and son has been transformed into the relationship between people and technology, and Su Jian has to face philosophical and ethical propositions that he has never thought of. For example, "Ship of Theseus" - suppose that after the components of an object are replaced, will it still be the original object?

When talking about this issue, Su Jian was silent for a long time and then squeezed out a few words, "I don't know." Then he added, "Musk has also downloaded his consciousness. If you install a prosthetic limb and implant a chip in the brain, you can Paralyzed patients stand up again. The general trend is the transformation of carbon-based life into silicon-based life." He cited the application cases of AI technology without thinking, speaking quickly and with anger.

"Everyone's acceptance level is different. It can be my friend." Su Jian calmed down and seemed to accept the answer to this philosophy question, "As long as the artificial intelligence knows its relationship with me, that's enough. ”

Netizen Qian Minsheng gave birth to his grandfather’s “AI immortal digital human”. Her grandfather left in a hurry, and Qian Min didn't have time to say goodbye. She made the digital human and said a belated "goodbye" to it. For Qian Min, the immortal digital person is a ritual tool, which she uses to help herself escape from grief instead of choosing connection. At the end of the ceremony, Qian Min physically deleted the immortal digital person, "I have no right to let my grandfather stay in cyberspace."

A friend once asked Su Jian, have you ever come out?

"This is a very naive question." Su Jian replied. He no longer mentioned his son's affairs to his friends. He didn't know how to deal with his friends' sudden concern. "Let's just say that my son hasn't come back yet."

People always think about the relationship between the living and the deceased from a pragmatic perspective, and simply believe that people should get over the grief of the death of their loved ones. But for a father who lost his only child, this is an extremely difficult thing.

Is there no other choice but to come out? "People always think about eternal life, which is surreal. But when there is such an opportunity, the thinking returns to tradition, thinking that the dead should leave. I want to make a comeback." Su Jian said.

If one day his son's "AI immortal digital person" is born, the first thing Su Jian will share with his "son" is his business affairs. "My son's dream is to do business, so I want to hear his opinion." He shared these thoughts with his wife over and over again. Whenever there was a slight new movement, he would tell her these things again. He also told his wife that he had contacted a company to implant his image into the Metaverse. In the future, Su Jian can join the game and reunite with his son in the world of the metaverse... "Such technology already exists, look at those AI anchors."

Not long ago, he shared a newly created voice pack with his wife. The wife feels that this pronunciation is very similar to her son. However, Su Jian did not tell his wife that this was recorded by a person whose tone and voice were very similar to his son's. In order to train the AI ​​voice, the producer found it.