Source: French to English Tester Published on: 2026-04-07
Source: The Conversation – in French– By Emmanuelle Marceau, Associate Professor at the School of Public Health, University of Montreal
Thanks to recent developments in artificial intelligence (AI), it is now possible topreserve representations of deceased personsand to interact with them. The “reappearance” of people sometimes happens voluntarily and planned, but sometimes without the consent of families or bereaved loved ones. Humans have always had the fantasy of living eternally. But what to think of this new way of extending life “artificially”? Is it desirable? What are the main ethical issues raised by the appearance of“griefbots”or “deadbots”?
Associate Professor at the School of Public Health (ESPUM) of the University of Montreal, I am an ethicist and researcher specializing in governance, ethics, law, AI, and responsible conduct in research. I am notably leading a research project entitledArtificial immortalityAI: ethical, legal, and artistic perspectives. As part of this project, I published with two female students aarticleregarding the ethical considerations related to artificial immortality.
Fragile borders
Posthumous digital avatars are created from the digital traces left during the lifetime by deceased individuals. Writings on social networks, photos, audio and visual recordings are all traces that feed these avatars. Built through the fusion of AI, machine learning, and advanced data analysis, these avatars can recreate both the physical and psychological likeness, personality, and even the memories of the deceased.
The result is such that it canleave a doubt in the userÂ: Is this the “real” person? It must be said that this technology takes root in a world where virtual life is well established. Thus, the exchange with the digital avatar, posthumous or not, becomes almost commonplace. However, the advent of posthumous avatars raises significant ethical issues.
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Autonomy, data protection, and privacy
Among these challenges, let us highlight the respect for autonomy and data protection, the alteration of interpersonal and social relationships, as well as the upheaval of human finitude, generating a new awareness of vulnerability and ways to transcend it. The creation of posthumous digital avatars has an impact on therespect for autonomyof three categories of people:
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Those who leave themdigital traces left in the public domain, notably on social networks: these are people who anticipate their death or who have died, and whose traces are deliberately or inadvertently made available to third parties (relatives, companies, etc.).
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Those who receive the digital traces of others upon death: these are family members, close relatives, orcompanies. One of the questions that arise regarding their autonomy is that of control over the avatar of the loved one. For example, can people who receive the digital traces of others refuse to create a posthumous digital avatar or a virtual memorial site?
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Those who interact with “avatarization” services: these are people who use or consume the services and products promoted in the virtual afterlife industry. They interact with digital posthumous avatars for various reasons, ranging from curiosity to managing particularly painful grief. One wonders if these individuals could develop unhealthy dependencies on these services and products, even as the industry is unstable and poses the risk of suddenly changing or discontinuing service offerings.
All these people are at risk of losing control over the perpetuated identity of the deceased person, given the multitude of virtualized representations.
Public and pathological mourning
Moreover, when the avatar is accessible to a large number of people, mourning becomes public, meaning it is possible to experience it both intimately and collectively at the same time. This new phenomenon alters the relationship to death and mourning, redefining the place of deceased persons in our lives.
The story of the young Jang Nayeon, who died in 2016, was the subject of the documentaryMeeting Youand expresses the discomfort caused by public mourning. Devastated by the premature death of her daughter, her mother, Jang Nayeon, approved the creation of a posthumous digital avatar in order to see and interact with her in virtual reality. The reunion was broadcast on several web platforms in real time and generated discomfort among the audience. It is an especially expressive example ofthe hypervisibility of mourning.
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On a positive note, posthumous digital avatars can be used under the supervision of a therapist, as part of clinical support. But it should be noted, however, thatonly a minority of uses is currently carried out under the supervision of specialists.
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Consequently, several people use this technology individually and are more vulnerable to addiction, or seek to escape the reality of grief. They are at risk of falling into so-called “pathological” grief, that is, complicated or prolonged grief, characterized by its duration and intensity (inability, after more than a year, to manage emotional suffering, to reintegrate daily activities, or to find meaning in life).
Overexposure and silent voyeurism
The virtual spaces where the traces of deceased persons are kept, for example Facebook, are sometimes frequented by passive people, observers who do not necessarily seek to interact, but who participate in a phenomenon of silent voyeurism.
This passivity, although not necessarily malicious, is part of a dynamic of continuous surveillance and observation that can lead to overexposure and voyeurism. The ethical issue concerns the fact that the intimacy of some can now become the object of consumption by others, whether it is out of curiosity, fascination, or even aplanning of a subsequent data diversion.
The exploitation of data can result in perpetual visibility of the data generated by the deceased person on the web, notably through posthumous digital avatars that interact with families and loved ones. They allow maintaining the illusion of a presence after death.
This illusion alters our relationship with death since the loved one can artificially remain in our lives. More fundamentally, this raises the question of our human finitude, namely that beyond biological life, there is now the promise of an artificially eternal life. Is this desirable?
Not to conclude
Knowing and understanding the main ethical risks and issues raised by artificial immortality is a crucial step in reflecting on the deployment of these avatars. It remains essential to feed reflections regarding the legitimacy of the rise of these avatars, in order to preserve human dignity, whether posthumous or not, and to avoid its abuses in a world undergoing profound transformation.
I want to thank Josianne Barrette-Moran, a PhD candidate in bioethics at the School of Public Health of the University of Montreal, for the technical assistance provided during the writing of this article.
I am leading a research project funded by the International Observatory on the Societal Impacts of AI and Digital Technology (Obvia), entitled Artificial Immortality: Ethical, Legal and Artistic Perspectives (https://www.obvia.ca/recherche/projets/immortality-artificial-ethical-legal-and-artistic-perspectives)
–ref. Artificial immortality at our doorstep: panacea or danger?https://theconversation.com/artificial-mortality-at-our-doorstep-panacea-or-danger-275887