Yikes. "Creepy" only starts to get at it. Will Saletan at Slate describes a program DOD hopes to develop that will give the children of soldiers sent away a sort of avatar parent to replace the one Uncle Sam is busy using:
For ages, we've been telling children that ghosts aren't real. But DOD has just put out a request for proposals to create what are, in effect, virtual ghosts. Another truism of parenting is about to become untrue.
The announcement, from the Defense Centers of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury, requests "a highly interactive PC or web-based application to allow family members to verbally interact with virtual renditions of deployed Service Members." The application must "produce compelling interactive dialogue between a Service member and their families ... using video footage or high-resolution 3-D rendering. The child should be able to have a simulated conversation with a parent about generic, everyday topics. For instance, a child may get a response from saying 'I love you', or 'I miss you', or 'Good night mommy/daddy.'"
Critics call the proposal "creepy" and "dystopian." They point out that no avatar can substitute for a parent. They think DOD should focus instead on "real-time video computer connection" between deployed personnel and their kids.
But what DOD is requesting will become real, because it's possible, and because the agency has correctly identified a human need. Kids want to see, hear, and talk to their parents. They need reassurance. And much of what they need to hear--"I love you," "Sleep tight," "Be good for Mommy"--is routine. It's easy to script these lines. If you're the parent, you can visually record them. Then you just need software to convert your recordings into 3-D video or, better yet, an interactive hologram.
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This is really creepy.
Get the soldiers to sign a few "in the event of my death" papers and mix it up with a some gung-ho press-releases, and we might have some new recruiting tools: Your older brother or classmate's avatar wants to tell you what he died for.
Saletan is right in that they will develop something, but it will probably find more use in something other than this "think of the children" application. Rule 42 is never far behind.
Will the kids be allowed to keep the virtual version for comfort when (if) their real parents return in damaged condition? The healthy-looking one saying "I love you" on their PC might be a lot more fun than the maimed, drug-dependent PTSD case screaming "Leave me alone, dammit!" in the living room.
"Dystopian" is right. Isn't it bad enough that we lie to our kids about Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy...? What is going to happen when these kids grow up a little more and realize all those nice conversations they had with their parents were just fakes constructed to try to keep them "happy"? Won't that be "damaging" for them?
In reality it's little more than escapism, a quick and convenient fix. I can't help but wonder if the DOD really thinks is the best solution for the children, or just the solution that's most convenient for them. I have to agree with the critics on this one: they'd be better off using their money to further actual human communication.