I've recently been thinking about the rapid advancements in AI technology. We've come to a point where someone can pose as a completely different person including physical appearance and voice. I've then came to a realization that there's a possibility for human beings to exist digitally long after they're gone.
So how can this be possible? Imagine a futuristic scenario like this: A young three year old girl is enrolled to the "Digital Metamorphosis" program by her parents. A very small transmitter is implanted near her ear. This establishes a connection between the device and an online server.
This device gathers every little data it can collect and transmits it to the server to be stored and analyzed by AI. The girl's every interaction with her surroundings, her reaction to certain scenarios, her likes and dislikes, trauma, core memories, every single minute detail will be recorded to the server from the moment the program starts up until her last day on Earth.
The AI will then be trained accordingly with every new information fed to it. This will finally materialize into a sentient digital program, an almost perfect replica of the girl's consciousness, existing in the cyberspace. Her relatives can talk to her, ask for advice, recall past events, and interact with her with the AI accurately simulating responses that the real girl would have done. It's as if she was still around and communicating with them in person. Who knows, maybe this AI can also be linked or transferred completely to an android.
A decade ago, I would have brushed off this kind of thought as fantasy. But the sudden emergence of AI in the past few years made me think twice on the possibilities for the future. It's both scary and fascinating for sure.
