Alexa Will Soon Use the Voice of Your Dead Relatives

Alexa, are you unable to?

Alexa, Amazon's smart speaker, is progressing toward acquiring the capacity to imitate the voice of your dead loved ones.

The business, which began by selling books online, is now working to establish itself as the creepiest IT firm ever.

Though the feature's goal is to lessen the suffering associated with losing a loved one.

a contentious ability

Can my grandmother finish reading me Wizard of Oz?, the young child is heard asking Alexa in a demo at Amazon's re:Mars conference. The book reading then begins in his late grandmother's voice, and Alexa responds with her standard "Okay."

According to Amazon, "AI can undoubtedly help their memories last, even while it cannot completely eradicate that sorrow of loss."

Many individuals are concerned about this characteristic, though, and believe that it would actually make it more difficult for people to grieve, which will cause them to experience delusions.

A voice recording in the person's voice, which can be less than one minute long, is required by the voice assistant. It then develops the ability to mimic that voice. This technique, deep-faking, has been used often in AI-generated video clips for a few years.

Since they can be used to create phony videos with other people's faces in them, deepfake films are closely examined. Deepfake audios will probably face a similar level of criticism.

Microsoft published a set of moral AI guidelines just hours before Amazon made its statement. As it's "simple to envisage how it may be used to inappropriately imitate speakers and fool listeners," it has severe controls on deepfake audio.

This is not the first AI initiative aiming at maintaining certain aspects of human existence after death. AI chatbots that can answer in a manner reminiscent of a deceased person's speech have already been developed in projects dating back to 2018.

Photos, transcripts of previous talks, and other mementos can serve as reminders of a person who has died, but they don't try to "resurrect" them. However, AI is currently being utilized as a tool to simulate someone's life who has died away.

Yet why?

It goes without saying that one of the most difficult things a person can go through is losing a loved one. We are more prone to face this anguish now than people in the past since technology has increased our connections and our social networks.

Despite all the technological advances made by humanity, we are still unable to really alleviate this misery. In the future, we might find a solution, but we also might not be able to. The anguish may seem to be eased by attempts to simulate the reality of the deceased, but they are more likely to make it worse.

Not merely the loss of a loved one renders us incapable of handling it. According to YouGov research, nearly half of British citizens fear dying, and comparable findings have been seen globally. The creator of Alexa and cofounder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, is currently working on a "cure for mortality."

You can speak with a grief counselor in Qatar if you are grieving the loss of a loved one.