Replika

From RISKS 33:15:

[...]

Grieving Mazurenko, Kuyda read their messages over and over again. At some point, she realized that these messages had the potential to be more than just a memory. She took all the data she had and, with her team and using Google-based neural networks, built a chatbot version of Mazurenko. The result was surprisingly human-like. She could text with the chatbot on past and future events, and digital Mazurenko came to life and felt real.  Digital Mazurenko was sad when she told him how much she missed him and joyful when she shared with him her recent achievements at her company.

[...]

Some people wanted to build a replica of themselves, and some wanted to build a bot for a person that they loved but was gone. These positive reactions encouraged Kuyda and her team to go further—to create fictitious characters that accompany people around the world. Replika is now a companion chatbot app available on almost any operating system with the slogan: ``Always here to listen and talk. Always on your side.'' Millions have downloaded the app, and it boasts hundreds of thousands of reviews, most highly positive.

[...]

https://news.yahoo.com/uncanny-future-romance-robots-already-013111368.html

As a grieving widower, I am more than a little freaked out by the implications of this. Being able to build a "perfect" friend is one level of self delusion. But the bereaved are already in danger from inappropriate relationships. The bereaved suffer extreme and desperate loneliness, not just from the loss of a loved one, but from social isolation, because most of their friends and family do not understand the depth of real grief. Couple that with the existing tendency to "converse" with the dead loved one (which can be healthy at some point in the grieving process, but can become an obsession), and the temptation to recreate a "Markov chain" replica (Replika?) can create a really (psychologically) dangerous situation.

(I've got a whole bunch of Gloria's email messages, going back possibly thirty years. Should I try it out? Would the "uncanny valley" freak me out? Would I become obsessed if it was too good?)