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AI “grief bots” trained on the dead person’s data promise to let mourners keep the conversation going.

Continuing bonds theory holds that carrying the dead within us is healthy—but the carrying is work.

Healing from loss and the business model point in opposite directions.

Outsourcing remembrance to an app risks the same fate as outsourcing navigation: the capacity fades.

I think of my mother every day. She’s there when I cook the food she used to cook for me, when I smell the flowers she loved, and when I face a tough decision at work. Her voice arrives unbidden, in moments of both strain and joy, and sometimes it feels like we talk more than we did when she was alive.

Psychologists have a name for this. They call it continuing bonds theory—the idea that a healthy relationship with someone we’ve lost doesn’t end at death. We continue to carry the dead with us after their passing: in memory, in ritual, in the inner dialogue that never quite stops. According to continuing bonds theory, this is a healthy and even necessary part of the grief process.

And now there is an industry that would like to monetize it.

The “Generative Ghosts”

CBS News recently reported on a growing sector of startups offering “generative ghosts.” These are AI chatbots trained on a dead person’s emails, photos, social media posts, and voice recordings, so that family and friends can keep talking with them after they’re........

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