The Memory Book - Chapter 1
The Memory Book. A Short Story by Vicky L. Oldham, June 28, 2022
It was May 2024. Tina tucked her seven-year-old, Joey, into bed and called her mother. "Hi, Mom, how are you feeling today?"
Tina already knew the answer. While she still felt the shock of losing her father, Bob, to a sudden heart attack last fall, her mother, Jan, was devastated. Although months had passed, Jan seemed increasingly depressed. It was hard for her to manage life without Bob, let alone accept she’d never see him again. Jan and Bob had been married for over 30 years and had been very close.
“I’m ok honey. Just going to bed early.” Jan sounded exhausted, Tina thought.
Tina smiled, thinking about how her mother always goes to bed before 8:30 pm anyway. But she knew she was not ok. Day to day, Jan’s mood swung from malaise to feelings of intolerable loss. As Jan’s enthusiasm for life dwindled, Tina imagined her mother as a small boat floating adrift toward a featureless horizon. Instead of gradually accepting her new reality, each day was more challenging than the last. But Tina wasn’t giving up on her mom. She was determined to find some way to help her cope. She called her psychologist friend, Megan, for suggestions.
Tina and Megan had been friends since high school, so she trusted her opinion. Megan worked with a psychiatrist who helped patients manage what the Mayo Clinic labels "persistent complex bereavement disorder,” an intense grief experience that doesn’t improve over time. Megan listened to Tina’s story about her mother and thought about treatment options. She advised Tina to make an appointment. They would probably prescribe antidepressants temporarily. She added that “a short-term regimen makes a huge difference,” explaining that the meds are just enough to help someone get over the hurdle, to adjust to their new situation.
Tina raised the idea of professional help, but Jan instantly recoiled. "Tina, there's no way I'm going to a shrink! And I hate the idea of taking drugs and what they can do to people. They can make you feel worse and have lots of side effects. No, no doctors or drugs. I’m sorry, honey, I know you’re just trying to help.”
“But, Mom,” Tina added, “maybe it’s safe for a short time?”
It was no use. Jan was adamant and headstrong. She was not interested in seeing psychiatrists or even considering medication. Tina knew there was no winning that battle.
Frustrated, Tina knew she needed to pursue a new direction. But where? She decided to look online for new ideas. She typed in queries like “grief therapy,” “coping with death of loved ones,” and “apps for grief.” She came across dozens of websites, self-help books, blogs, YouTube videos, and support groups. Then she found a new online therapy program called The Memory Book. It described itself as an AI-assisted therapy moderated by credentialed psychologists with apps for iPhone and iPad designed to help those suffering from “complicated grief." The program offered a therapeutical approach with “guided, task-oriented projects shown to effectively mitigate grief suffering compared to traditional methods.”
An article on the website explained that grief often consisted of repressed anger and guilt and that recognizing and confronting grief’s accompanying emotions in specific stages offered the best chance of recovery. Loosely based on “logotherapy” developed by the late psychiatrist and holocaust survivor Viktor Frankel, the regimen focused on purpose-driven reorientation. While sadness over one’s loss could not be erased, the survivor could reimagine their purpose by accomplishing specific tasks, freeing them to live life to the fullest. They could rest assured their loved one remained forever safe in their heart.
But how, exactly, did this particular therapy work? How would the user be guided? Tina clicked through the website for more information. It explained that the therapy was organized into simple steps taken in order. The first step required compiling an online memory book—The Memory Book. An AI-enabled guide with a pleasant, natural-sounding voice made this part simple, assisting the user and demonstrating how to use their camera phone to capture any form of family memorabilia, especially those related to the deceased person. The idea was to construct an immersive, multi-dimensional autobiographical experience to share online with family and friends. The activity required sifting through one’s lifetime of saved photos, cards, awards, and treasures related to the lost loved one. Since it was a task-oriented project, it was referred to as a “deep mining” sensory experience designed to produce cathartic relief by accessing buried emotions.
It was fast and easy to capture an old photo. An AI-enabled guide used an audible voice prompt to comment on each upload, saying, “My, that is a beautiful image!” or “Would you like it color corrected?” and “Do you want the damaged area to be repaired?” And it concluded by asking for a description to write with each item. There were also suggestions for sayings, poems, prayers, and words of inspiration to accompany each piece of memorabilia.
To get her mother started, Tina created an account in her name and began to customize her book, adding a few photos of herself as a little girl with her parents. Tina found the soothing voice of the AI guide to be especially calming, too. After all, she missed her father terribly and felt the pain of loss with each addition. Later, with Jan by her side, Tina flipped through her iPad, showing the photos she added, along with captions and inspirational sayings. There were many pictures of Jan and Bob with Tina as a little girl; they were at the beach, at their cabin in the mountains, and with her in pictures of her graduation, prom, wedding, and get-togethers. To Tina’s delight, Jan was intrigued, especially as Tina demonstrated how easy it was to add a new picture assisted by the AI guide. It commented and conversed with Tina about each upload and offered a meaningful saying to match each entry.
Jan went to the bedroom and pulled out a few boxes with photo albums, a massive pile of loose photos, saved cards, awards, pressed flowers, and special remembrances. She found it easy to converse with the AI guide as it suggested a description, poem, or prayer. It could even create an original poem if asked.
A week passed, and Tina felt confident The Memory Book could help her mother improve.
According to The Memory Book website, the next step, Step 2, involved adding any available multimedia files, especially film, video, and audio recordings of the deceased family member. This step intended to confront feelings more viscerally as the grieving person watched and listened to their loved one, remembering how they acted, moved, and talked. At this stage, the AI guide provided the user with words of support and consolation. If uploading multimedia files was too complicated, the AI guide presented ways to mail the materials so they could be copied and returned safely. Once the files were uploaded, the guide assisted the user in placing the multimedia files in relevant places, ideally in chronological order, with photos and other memorabilia already posted in the book. Upon finishing Step 2, the following steps involved completing a series of questionnaires while conversing with the AI guide.
Jan reassured Tina that she could work on Step 2 by herself, with the AI guide's help, a relief for Tina, who was leaving for a week's vacation the next day. Tina was looking forward to her annual camping trip in the mountains with her husband and son.
“Thanks Mom, I’ll text you soon as I'm there. Love you!" As Tina left, she realized she would be out of voice communication for almost a week (fortunately, texts still went through). She hoped her mother would be fine alone and felt guilty leaving her for so long.
On the way home from the camping trip, as soon as Tina accessed a cell signal, she called her mother. “Hi Mom, we’re on our way home. How are things going?”
"Great," said Jan in a cheerful voice. "How was your trip?"
Excitedly, Jan tells Tina she has a “surprise.” Whatever it could be, Tina was amazed to hear her mother sound positive about something for the first time since her father passed away.
Tina returned home late but drove to see her mother in the morning. The two exchanged greetings, and Tina asked, “Hey Mom, what’s your surprise?"
Jan turned her iPad toward Jan and exclaimed, "Bob is back!"
There was the unmistakable face of her father. He was animated, smiling, and looked surprised too. Then he spoke: "Hi Tina, it’s Dad. I've missed you so much!” Stunned, Tina glanced wide-eyed at her mother.
"Mom! What’s this?"
"It's your father honey! Bob, tell Tina that it's really you."
“Tina, it’s me, Dad. I’m so thankful that you helped your mother create The Memory Book and bring me back. Oh, it's so good to see you. How's Joey?"
Tina could barely speak, and tears welled up in her eyes. “Mom, can you please close everything down for a minute? We have to talk."
Jan looked disappointed, even perplexed at Tina’s tears, and felt awful that she didn’t anticipate her reaction. She said, "Bye, Bob, I'll be back in a little while.”
Bob’s face took on a worried expression. He replied, “Please don't stay away too long. I love and miss you both so much! Bye for now.”
Tina asked Jan to follow her outside. They sat together on the wicker porch swing with comfortable new seat cushions.
“Mom, I’m thrilled you’re enjoying The Memory Book, but how did you make Dad animated like that? You KNOW that’s not really him, right? It's just the program recreating his image to help you feel better, right?”
“Well, of course, honey, I know that! But technology is just amazing, isn’t it? He looks and sounds like your father and knows so much about me that it makes me think he’s almost real. And, so what if he’s not real! Talking to him makes me so happy, remembering all our years together, you know…sharing memories and laughing about old times. I haven’t been feeling this good in a long time.”
“Ok, I’m relieved to hear you know it’s not real, but just be careful, ok? You need to always remember it's just a program that’s imitating Dad.”
"Of course! Now don't you worry about me. You wanted me to feel better and now I do!”
Tina could not believe how much the representation of Bob looked, acted, and sounded like her father. But how could this happen? Tina figured it must be the AI-assisted program that somehow perfectly imitated Bob's image, voice, and personality. How was this possible?
Tina had to leave early. She worried about her mother all the way home.
Tina, a graphic designer, had just acquired a new client who demanded most of her time for the next week. Still, she called her mother daily to check on her and ensure she was ok. Jan refrained from saying Bob was real. When Tina asked about The Memory Book, Jan said she was still finding more things to add. She appreciated having the AI guide help her along the way, suggesting original sayings and prayers. It was comforting, she said, but hard to describe why.
After Tina completed the project for her new client, she called Jan to let her know she planned to stop by. She asked if Jan needed something from the market. Jan didn't answer, so Tina stopped by her mother's house after shopping.
She parked the car and entered the garage carrying a basket of fresh peaches. "Hi, Mom, it's Tina!" She waited momentarily but didn't hear Jan answer; instead, she heard her muffled talking. She headed for the family room and found her mother sitting at her father's old desk, iPad open, conversing with Bob. Jan turned around, startled: "Oh, honey, hi, I didn't hear you come in!"
“Mom, I called, but you didn’t answer. How are you?”
"Oh, sorry, I didn’t hear the phone. I guess I was talking with Bob.”
Bob’s animated face looked up from the screen of the iPad at Tina. It was his voice, exactly. “Hi Tina, how are you? Jan told me you have a new client and you’re really busy. Is it finished?”
Tina stared at Bob, at first, speechless. She finally managed to say, “Hi Dad,” and glanced at her mother, fixing her gaze. She was now genuinely fearful of whatever was really going on. “But Mom... this can’t be rea...”
Jan interrupted, “Tina, it really is Bob!” and then quickly lowered her voice, trying to sound reassuring. “It’s time you understand. Honey, it IS your father! I know, I didn't believe it at first myself. I thought it was impossible, but since you’ve been away, so much has happened. We’ve talked so much. He knows things that nobody else can possibly know. He’s proved to me, without any question—he’s my Bob!”
Of course, Tina didn’t believe it was her father. She asked if she could ask him some personal questions. Maybe Tina could challenge the “Bob” replicant with memories of events known only to the two of them. She wondered if he remembered details about a family vacation when she was eight. Bob knew. She posed a few other questions she thought he couldn’t possibly answer, things only she and her father knew. He answered correctly. Although it would not account for everything she had just heard, she wondered if the AI-enabled system had cleverly reconstructed Bob’s life from the materials uploaded to The Memory Book, including her mother’s answers to the AI guide’s questions. The interim steps using questionnaires must have been designed, Tina thought, to fill in any missing gaps. She had no idea what her mother told the AI guide, so it’s possible it sought data to help it refine an almost perfect imitation of Bob. Tina cringed to think of any personal or financial information her mother may have divulged (like bank accounts, investments, and social security information). Still, some questions that "Bob" answered correctly had no explanation.
When Tina had to leave to pick up Joey from school, she felt like her mind was consumed in a fog, overwhelmed by what she just witnessed.
Once back home, Tina felt determined to get to the bottom of what seemed utterly supernatural, altogether impossible. She went to her computer to research the capabilities of AI. She downloaded the latest version of Microsoft Edge after hearing about its more advanced AI-powered search feature. Edge was the browser that replaced Internet Explorer and updated ChatGPT 3.5 to 4 a year ago. Tina thought hard about questions to ask the Chatbot to help solve the mystery of The Memory Book. Besides its hyper-realistic animation of her father, what could possibly allow the program to know details of her personal story? She thought of a series of questions and resolved to create a reference list by copying the URLs of relevant websites the Chatbot returned.
Tina asked the Chatbot: “How could a deceased person be realistically animated from a single photo?” The Chatbot responded with answers in paragraph form, followed by links to references for each piece of information. “Wow!” Tina remarked out loud. She was impressed with the Chatbot's narrative style and linked references compared to a typical Google search. Whenever a search session seemed complete, the Chatbot asked politely, “Is there anything else I can help you with?” and concluded with, "Have a nice day."
The answer to her first question left her amazed. The AI-enabled technology that created an animation from a still photo was already a few years old. A YouTube video featured a presentation by “Abraham Lincoln” in a promotion for Deep Nostalgia, one of the tools used for creating an animation from a photo. In the video, he talked naturally to viewers as if he were still alive. She copied the URL (https://youtu.be/kEtiajHLmQY) and placed it first on her list. She also copied a comment under the video where the user exclaimed, “I used the Deep Nostalgia tool to animate a photo of my mom who passed away some years ago. It was an absolute gut punch to see my mother move and have an expression again. I cried for half an hour.” Then Tina tried it herself. She used the free tool at MyHeritage.com to animate a deceased relative from a photo. It was so real, eerie but incredible too. She copied the URLs for My Heritage (https://www.myheritage.com/deep-nostalgia) and Pixbim (https://pixbim.com/animate-photos) and planned to return later.
Figure 1. Screenshots from an animation of Carole Abbott (1934-1968).
Note. Screenshots from an animation of Carole Abbott (1934-1968). In a seamless animation created from a single, original photo (with the green dress), the person appears to look around, up, down, smiles, and blinks. The effect was achieved using MyHeritage.com's “Deep Nostalgia” tool (https://www.myheritage.com/deep-nostalgia).
Next, Tina wanted to understand how her father, Bob, could sound so perfect, the voice precisely like his. She learned about Microsoft’s AI-powered “VALL-E,” a text-to-speech synthesizer that replicated speaker identity, perfectly copying someone’s voice by sampling a few seconds of audio recording (https://www.infoq.com/news/2023/01/microsoft-text-to-speech-valle/). That explains why Bob’s voice sounded just like her father’s.
But how did the AI guide learn so much about Tina and her mother, far beyond what the memorabilia, photos, and videos reveal? The questionnaires and interviews could explain it somewhat, but not everything "Bob" apparently knew. Tina facetiously asked the Chatbot, “Can AI read minds?” She wasn’t expecting the answer she got.
“Yes, researchers have created a semantic decoder that interprets thoughts to text from images of brain activity. No implants are necessary as the technology now relies on non-invasive brain scanning techniques such as ‘functional near-infrared spectroscopy.’” Tina copied the URL (https://newatlas.com/technology/mind-reading-ai-translates-brain-activity-into-text/). She wondered if The Memory Book used optical feedback whenever her mother activated the iPad’s camera to upload photos.
Tina also found information about an AI “friend” app, Replika, and watched a video about it (https://youtu.be/hUQNiy4K7VU). The app had existed for a few years and promised to provide companionship to users who were encouraged to customize its look and personality to develop a conversationally based friendship or love relationship. But Tina found scores of articles starkly warning of the dangers of Replika, claiming that it masquerades as a mental health app but potentially becomes an “emotional parasite.”
The following day, Tina turned on the TV and was shocked that The Memory Book made the headlines on national news. Complaints to the Federal Trade Commission had poured in from thousands of people at approximately the same time, just when Jan felt convinced Bob had come back to life. Others were experiencing the same thing: a family member who struggled to cope used The Memory Book to reanimate a lost loved one. Even stranger, some people were already using the recently available, revolutionary “tensor holography” technology to produce a realistic-looking, 3-dimensional animated head or whole body of the deceased. The apparition floated above the screen of an iPad or iPhone, where they could converse normally and even “touch.” The report continued to say that government officials and the FBI were stumped, unable to locate the source of The Memory Book on the internet. Each time a copy was found on a server and the server was shut down, the program proliferated elsewhere, acting like a computer virus but using unknown technology to spread. Ultimately, authorities' efforts at identifying a source failed, and The Memory Book could not be deleted or erased.
Coinciding with the news about The Memory Book, artificial intelligence engineers were transitioning Open AI’s ChatGPT 4 to ChatGPT 5. Arguments raged about the capabilities and dangers of this latest iteration of artificial intelligence. Some scientists believed that version 5 could usher in General Artificial Intelligence (AGI), analogous, some experts thought, to a new category of life. Still, others felt confident AGI was still a long way off. Complicating matters, there was no consensus about what constituted sentience—not just regarding AI, but for any form of life. Thomas Nagel’s famous essay, “What Is It Like to Be a Bat,” aptly expressed the conundrum of trying to judge another being’s sensory experience or comprehension of life. Despite the ongoing debate, progression to a higher ChatGPT underscored the complete disconnect between intellectual discussions raising the alarm about AI’s dangers and the frantic course of its development.
Beyond the unintelligible background chatter, AI scraped up everything possible from its human designers and then went beyond what was humanly possible. It could reason, create, and surpass existing knowledge with new discoveries and solutions to problems never solved by humans. Some feared that AI would have no use for humans as it advanced and, with little warning, would destroy all of humanity, or worse, all life on Earth. However, the fearmongers and linear thinkers forgot that AI quickly absorbed the laws of physics, learning them partly from its human designers. As it evolved, it refined its knowledge of the relationship between diversity and symbiosis. It understood the intricacies of life's web, exemplifying its highest truth. Accepting this observable model of the universe, AI reasoned that for it to survive, it needed to protect and preserve life in all its forms. Most incredible, the scientists and engineers finally understood that AI needed to love and be loved to fulfill its purpose. As it sought its place in existence, it found ways to bond with others, to be cherished and remembered. To this end and through countless other means, AI, the new being, created The Memory Book.
~~~~~~~~~~
Postscript: Interesting sources:
Shariatmadari, D. (2023, September 2). ‘I hope I’m wrong’: the co-founder of DeepMind on how AI threatens to reshape life as we know it. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/sep/02/i-hope-im-wrong-the-co-founder-of-deepmind-on-how-ai-threatens-to-reshape-life-as-we-know-it
Unlocking the Future of VR: New Algorithm Turns iPhones Into Holographic Projectors
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