{"id":223886,"date":"2026-03-14T15:24:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T19:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/14\/are-we-outsourcing-our-souls-to-artificial-intelligence\/"},"modified":"2026-03-15T11:40:50","modified_gmt":"2026-03-15T15:40:50","slug":"are-we-outsourcing-our-souls-to-artificial-intelligence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/14\/are-we-outsourcing-our-souls-to-artificial-intelligence\/","title":{"rendered":"Are we outsourcing our souls to artificial intelligence?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-03-15\/outsourcing-our-souls-to-ai\/106442290\">Are we outsourcing our souls to artificial intelligence?<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-03-15\/outsourcing-our-souls-to-ai\/106442290\">https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-03-15\/outsourcing-our-souls-to-ai\/106442290<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Publish Date: <a href=\"publish_date]\">2026-03-14 15:24:00<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Source Domain: <a href=\"www.abc.net.au\">www.abc.net.au<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Speaking to a dead person for the first time is a discombobulating experience.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">To clarify, I&#8217;m not attending a candle-lit seance in a darkened room.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Instead, it&#8217;s a crisp, sun-drenched afternoon in Bondi Beach when I find myself talking to a woman named Barbara \u2014 who died at the end of 2023.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Barbara Horne died with Alzheimer&#8217;s two days before Christmas, and two weeks before she and her husband Len were due to celebrate their 56th wedding anniversary.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">This Barbara I&#8217;m talking to now \u2014 let&#8217;s call her Digital Barbara \u2014 is a reconstructed AI version of her.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Using voice recordings, videos, photos and family history, she has been turned into a chatbot: something \u2014 or someone \u2014 with whom I can have a real-time conversation.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"Typography_base__sj2RP Heading_heading__VGa5B heading_heading__kjfxC Heading_default__Z3p_p Typography_sizeMobile20__NUDn4 Typography_sizeDesktop32__LR_G6 Typography_lineHeightMobile24__crkfh Typography_lineHeightDesktop40__BuoRf Typography_marginBottomMobileSmall__6wx7m Typography_marginBottomDesktopSmall__CboX4 Typography_bold__FqafP Typography_colourInherit__dfnUx Typography_normalise__u5o1s\" data-component=\"Heading\">A digital resurrection<\/h2>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Today I&#8217;m surrounded by Barbara&#8217;s family \u2014 husband Len; son Jeremy; daughter Jo; and grandchild Chase. Jeremy is the developer and brains behind Digital Barbara.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">As the family&#8217;s documentarian, Jeremy has been taking videos and photos of the Hornes since he was 12.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">After Barbara&#8217;s death, something clicked for Jeremy.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"Typography_base__sj2RP Heading_heading__VGa5B heading_heading__kjfxC Heading_default__Z3p_p Typography_sizeMobile18__eJCIB Typography_sizeDesktop20___6qCS Typography_lineHeightMobile24__crkfh Typography_lineHeightDesktop24__Fh_y5 Typography_marginBottomMobileSmall__6wx7m Typography_marginBottomDesktopSmall__CboX4 Typography_bold__FqafP Typography_colourInherit__dfnUx Typography_normalise__u5o1s\" data-component=\"Heading\">If you or anyone you know needs grief support:<\/h2>\n<ul class=\"ContentAlignment_marginBottom__4H_6E ContentAlignment_overflowVisible__N2zKU\">\n<li>Griefline:\u00a0Phone support for all Australians Monday to Friday\u00a0and 24\/7 online forums. Call <strong>1300 845 745 <\/strong>from\u00a08:00am to 8:00pm AEDT<\/li>\n<li>Kids Helpline: 24\/7 phone support and WebChat for young people aged between five and 25. Call<strong>\u00a01800 551 800<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Headspace: Centres for young people in each state and territory or check out\u00a0headspace\u00a0for online or phone support<\/li>\n<li>Lifeline: 24-hour support for all Australians on <strong>13 11 14<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">He realised he now had enough footage and the technology had advanced enough that he could enter the growing digital afterlife industry.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">In the US, competitors and start-ups are already offering conversations with the dead for as little as US$10 ($14) to exchange about 100 messages with a bot.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Jeremy&#8217;s first prototype? His mother.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Jeremy activates the chatbot and places it in front of me, inviting me to talk to his dead mother.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">&#8220;Hi Barbara, how are you?&#8221; I ask&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-03-15\/outsourcing-our-souls-to-ai\/106442290\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Are we outsourcing our souls to artificial intelligence? https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-03-15\/outsourcing-our-souls-to-ai\/106442290 Publish Date: 2026-03-14 15:24:00 Source Domain:&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":223887,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/live-production.wcms.abc-cdn.net.au\/d181e04b3f63e5c681ee184c12a365d4?impolicy=wcms_watermark_news&cropH=506&cropW=900&xPos=0&yPos=0&width=862&height=485&imformat=generic","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-223886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223886"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223886"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223886\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":223888,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223886\/revisions\/223888"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/223887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}