As generative AI becomes commercially accessible, it is being used to exacerbate loneliness as well as replace human care and relationships with artificially created synthetic relations
This essay is part of the series: AI F4: Facts, Fiction, Fears and Fantasies.
On 16 November 2023, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared loneliness as a ‘global public health concern’. This announcement comes as global institutions re-align themselves to post-COVID-19 realities and reconsider their priorities. It comes as an important window of opportunity for us to consider the experiences of digital loneliness and its consequences on the political practicalities of lives. The emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) adds a new dimension of fantasy and fear to the human condition of loneliness. By altering our virtual realities through algorithmic black boxes and controlling the ‘what’, ‘when’, and ‘how’ of our information flows, AI becomes an important determinant of our relationship with loneliness.
On the theme of political practicalities, in the Origins of Totalitarianism, Hannah Arendt makes a very poignant connection between social isolation and loneliness with susceptibility to authoritarianism and totalitarianism. In particular, she highlights how loneliness—“isolation and lack of normal social relationships”—makes people vulnerable to violent forms of nationalism. In general, she writes “While isolation concerns only the political realm of life, loneliness concerns life as a whole. Totalitarian government, like all tyrannies, certainly could not exist without destroying the public realm of life, i.e., without destroying, by isolating men, their political capacities. But totalitarian domination as a form of government is not content with this isolation and destroys private life as well. it bases itself on loneliness, on the experience of not belonging to the world at all, which is the most radical and desperate experiences of man.”
The emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) adds a new dimension of fantasy and fear to the human condition of loneliness.
If we look at the political history of resistance, we will find solidarity and collective action taking a pivotal role. If we look at contemporary experiences of isolation, we see digital technologies (Artificial Intelligence in particular) playing a divisive role. This essay is an attempt to reconcile the metaphorical and real digital distance of our modern lives and make sense of its political consequences. By taking a specific Chinese case study on generative AI-enabled ‘GriefBots’, this essay relocates Arendt’s politicisation of loneliness in a world mediated by AI.
First reported in April 2023, thousands of Chinese people were found using generative AI (GenAI) tools to grieve the people who had passed away during the COVID-19 pandemic. By using old images, text messages, emails and other forms of written communication and visual representations, they brought back their loved ones to life.
This process of digital assemblage of AI and GenAI technologies first started in 2020. It was led by a young Chinese professional—Yu Jialin. It began as his personal project to mourn the demise of his grandfather and as an attempt to have all the conversations he wished he had had with him when he was still around. By 2022-23, he had refined the technology to a stage that allowed thousands of Chinese nationals to use it to cope with personal losses in the aftermath of COVID-19. When asked, most people claimed that they valued the ‘psychological comfort’ of these AI-enabled avatars. They often found it easier to speak to ‘digital humans’ than actual people. A popular application of this can be seen in popular Chinese blogger, Wu Wulian, who in March created a video titled ‘Generating my Grandma’s virtual digital human using AI tools’, that walked the viewers through his process of using ChatGPT, AI Painting, and speech synthesis to create a responsive digital avatar of his grandmother. “The video I made is mainly to ease my regrets through the use of AI technology and help me to not think so much of the past,” he said in the blog post as reported by The Straits Times.
First reported in April 2023, thousands of Chinese people were found using generative AI (GenAI) tools to grieve the people who had passed away during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Beyond the individual use-cases, funeral homes, and businesses like Shanghai Fushouyun started using this technology to help the attendees of the funeral say their final farewells to the deceased using the same AI tools. “We hope to let the living understand that death is not the end of life. People want to use AI to recover the deceased because they need to release their emotions,” Yu Hao, the Chief Executive Officer of Fushouyun told Guangzhou Daily.
If we look outside the world of mourning and funerals, this same technology can be found in the rise of digital girlfriends and AI therapy. The underlying concerns of loneliness and isolation remain the same.
The WHO declaration of loneliness as a ‘global public health concern’ makes Arendt’s prophetic words on the political consequences of loneliness come to life. We see loneliness at a scale that has not been human history observed in yet. However, the challenge is not just of scale.
Arendt’s scholarship on totalitarianism provides important points of introduction to interrogate the politics of digital loneliness.
As GenAI becomes commercially accessible, we will see newer ways in which AI is used to exacerbate loneliness as well as replace human care and relationships with artificially created synthetic relations. The genius of AI-enabled loneliness is not in its scale or reach, it is in the fact that technology changes the nature of loneliness itself. It creates distance between atomised individuals and then fills this distance with tailored technology that in the moment makes us feel loved and understood, but after a few moments reminds us how lonely we are. This cycle of love and loneliness creates a vicious cycle that is then commodified, capitalised, and politicised.
In this context, Arendt’s scholarship on totalitarianism provides important points of introduction to interrogate the politics of digital loneliness. It’s a necessary step in garnering the right attention and mobilising the required resources. The way digital technologies are evolving, we will find our modern battle ground in the atomised minds of the individuals. Tackling loneliness is an important mechanism of building resilience for our digital futures.
Varya Srivastava is the VP of Product and Govt. Affairs at Network Capital.
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VVarya Srivastava - Varya is the VP of Product and Govt. Affairs atNetwork Capital. In this capacity she works closely with the Government of India's ...
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