Slashdot Mirror
New Patented System Brings the Dead Back to "Life"
__roo writes "Today's New York Times [free login req. to read - ed.]reports that Michigan inventor Lynn Svevad has invented the "Ancestral Computer Program", which virtually brings a deceased relative "back to life" by drawing upon stored data. It uses voice recognition and stored animations and responses recorded while the person was alive to simulate the responses that the relative would have given, simulating 'a two way conversation between the user and the relative.' Search www.uspto.gov for patent #5,946,657. Didn't I see this in an old episode of Max Headroom? (see episode #8)"
Oh, this is just like Rimmer from Red Dwarf. Does the image have an "H" on its forehead?
No, no one has pointed out any prior art in SF. Look, people, having just an idea is NOT prior art. To be prior art, the description in a story would have to show HOW to do it, not just say it can be done.
I forget which book it was in (#3 I think), but it does go into some detail about how, at first, they wee merely recording responses of people for playback, then they go more sophisticated at it, finally ending up with machine-stored personalities (although they did need the Heechee Technology to go that far). Plus, add in the fact that the Heechee carried their machine stored dead relatives around on their waists (they even called them "ancestors" or "old ones"), and I think you've broken this stupid patent..
---
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Does this mean that if I'm legally dead for a couple minutes (my heart stops or something...) and then come back, will they sue me for patent infringment and/or demand a royalty?
Would we ever truly die then?
;-)
Well the death of the universe might present some problems
Beer recipe: free! #Source
Cold pints: $2 #Product
Just imagine they use this thing to have Celine Dion singing "My heart will go on" for centuries after her death ?...
But, by the way, I'm wondering... Aren't they already using it right now for the Rolling Stones ???
Thomas Miconi
Karma Police - Enforcing peace of mind by all possible means.
The "ancestral computer program" idea occurs in (at least) one other Egan book. IIRC this is the main theme in one of the short stories published in Axiomatic.
If God had intended for man to multitask, he would have given him two hands. -Lao Tze
Somebody should have patented hate crime over the internet. It would give lawyers something useful to do. Well, gotta pay my respects to the Finn...
If my family stuck me in one of those, Id be insulted. Brad
Acually, I believe stories like this, while they may be 'stupid', are worthwhile having on slashdot because of the thoughts and discussions they provoke.
For example, this one brought up:
the increasing non-viability of patenting
whether humans can be replicated with AI
what human life really is
the potential misuse of technology for 'charlatanism'
And last and not least, your post because of the tattoo remark. I near bust a gut at that...
Several people have already pointed out that this idea already exists in science fiction literature (the instance I thought of immediately, and which is significantly closer to this patent than some examples, is Moses Kaldor, in Arthur C Clarke's Songs of Distant Earth, talking about the possibility of a simulation of his dead wife that he could talk to). However it strikes me that this may not be enough to be considered prior art.
IANAL, but there is a considerable difference between something saying "We've invented virtual people" and "We've invented a way of having virtual people"; this patent is claiming the latter. It's possible that some of the literature people have been talking about here does actually cover some key details (I have a feeling that Songs of Distant Earth does so indirectly). I'm not positive, however, that it matters.
(I'll repeat at this point: IANAL. Also, my 'analysis' of the two patents in question is hampered by the fact that the USPTO website doesn't appear to contain the details of the claims. However I've checked against the IBM patents website, and I don't think I've missed anything that I should have read, so it should just be down to whether I've understood it or not.)
Most of the prior art cited in the patent is concerned with technical and mechanical solutions to problems in implementing this idea; things like voice-synchronised animation, and developments in human-computer interaction through speech. These don't concern us here.
However the last one, US pat. # 5,730,603 (the snappily-titled "Audiovisual simulation system and method with dynamic intelligent prompts"), seems to me to contain all the supposedly-new ideas of US pat. # 5,946,657 (the ancestral computer program one). The latter appears to me to simply be a development of ideas from the previous one - most of the description appears to simply be a rephrasing of the earlier patent, restricting the situation to deceased relatives, and adding a couple of essentially irrelevant user interface issues ("selecting a deceased relative or friend from among those stored in said storage system to communicate interactively with" can hardly be considered a new invention, and "selecting a special occasion which is prompted by a date in the computer operating system" and issuing a greeting based on it is already available in various PIMs, including Microsoft's if I remember correctly). The only interesting part is the invention of a way of aging video and audio, but I think that's been done as well.
Even if the new patent is valid with respect to the older one, I can't see what it is claiming as a new invention except the idea of interacting with a deceased relative - and that, I'd argue, certainly is covered by prior art in sci-fi literature (certainly, it adds nothing to the ideas in Songs of Distant Earth).
Of course, it's possible that buried within the claims is something genuinely new that I've missed, but I doubt there's anything that's widely applicable. It's also possible that I've totally misread something and am talking rubbish.
As to the issue of whether anyone should bother challenging it now - is that really worthwhile? There are many more objectionable patents that should be tackled first, I'd argue. In any case, it's entirely possible that no one will actually build a system which contravenes this patent before it expires (especially since the patent only covers responsive systems - there's nothing at all about ones that can, in the wonderful phrasing of clinical psychiatry, "spontaneously verbalise", and which would be required for a true simulated personality).
Incidentally, the IBM patent search is considerably better laid out than the USPTO one: the patent in question.
James
(Who isn't a lawyer, and isn't even a US citizen, for that matter)
Also in Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson (third book in the Neuromancer books) The Fin, who was killed in Count Zero (the second book) turns up as a "Personality Construct" that people go to get advice and stuff. The "Personality Construct" is ppretty much a more advanced version of what this guy patented. This is definitely another example of prior art.
This type of thing was what Geordi did in an episode of ST:TNG. Not having an engineer from Utopia Planetia available to test a new engine theory, Geordi had the computer generate a simulation of the person using all her notes, articles, lectures, etc.
The result was a hologram that used: voice recognition and stored animations and responses recorded to simulate the responses that the engineer would have given, simulating a two way conversation between Geordi and the engineer. Sound familiar?
My god...can anyone patent stuff that some writer thought up for a TV show? I'm gonna patent matter transporters. God knows they've taken them apart enough times on ST:TNG that I should know them by heart...I think I can draw a Heinsenburg compensator...
F the USPTO. I'd like to know what the hell they actually do with the $1800 they take from you...
But of course the guy's wasted his money with his patent lawyer - the patent's gonna run out before the technology is available and now there's prior art on the books at the patent office - when the time comes to start uploading people no one can own it - in reallity I think he's done us a favor
The person's hope is to cash in on the future when this sort of thing (recreating dead people) will be common for Hollywood movies - and hopes to receive big royalties.
But this idea has been thrown about television for the last 20 years at least - and in science fiction long before that.
This patent is not enforceable.
Is this a replacement for Heaven or something? "Timmy, your grandfather lives in Heaven now. Say a prayer." "Timmy, your grandfather lives in the TV now. Go on, talk to him." ?
The only problem is that they would not be complete emulations of the originals.
You will just have to tell 'em to keep them out of towns with busloads of Microsloshed account executives out on a Convention. I wish you luck.
There was also an ep in which Data gives a voice to a diary created by a boy (Tommy?) who was destroyed by the Crystalline Entity. It was the one where that (woman) scientist found a way to resonate the C.E. to pieces/death.
In the TNG episode "The Inner Light", Picard's brain is directly accessed by a probe from a long-dead civilisation, and during his experience he lives among them for 40 years, eventually (at an apparently great age) witnessing the launch of the probe itself.
I have to say, this was my personal greatest lump-in-throat, tears-in-eyes moment of the whole of Star Trek. A generic meme off the telly...
george
Does anyone here not know that we have to login to NYT? Can't we just, like, assume that everyone knows and save ourselves the redundancy?
I think there is a world market for maybe five personal web logs.
Hrm, think about what you're saying. Almost everything is in science fiction before it exists: space ships, satilites, robots, computers, video phones, etc. Simply becuase someone concieves a particular devices doesnt mean that they've invented it. This individual hasn't patented the idea of a "constuct" instead he has patented a specific way to achieve one. This is a valid patent even if the whole thing is a little hoaky.
as a couple other posters here have noted, the TV show "red dwarf" used the same idea for the entire series.. and if THAT isn't prior art..
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
This stuff goes *way* back.
Or that old movie with R-45, etc., where the R indicated the percentage of human capacity that the machine reached, allowing transferance at R-100.
oh, like in _Captian Power?_ i always wondered what was so bad about that...
you mean "Brain tape" don't you? i loved that term, it'd be great to have my entire being summed up in a linear-access storage medium.
Somebody get our flag back!
IANAL, but there is a considerable difference between something saying "We've invented virtual people" and "We've invented a way of having virtual people"; this patent is claiming the latter.
This patent is so vague that it's hard to believe that it was granted. Well... no, I guess it's not all that hard to believe, given the USPTO's track record. The point is that it seems like it would cover ANY computer-based system that attempts to recreate the likeness and speech of a deceased person. It doesn't go into any real detail about how this is done. Given this information, it seems likely that this was an attempt to patent the idea of simulating communication with the deceased on a computer, not just to patent one specific method of doing so. In that case, I believe any prior art that shows that this is not a new idea should be enough to invalidate the patent, or at least require them to include a lot more specific detail.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Well now we don't have to worry anymore.
May your soul reach heaven before the devil realizes you are dead
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0312943423/ qid=936739367/sr=1-8/002-4166230 -2313032
=DIVIDE BY CUCUMBER ERROR: REINSTALL UNIVERSE AND REBOOT=
If Linux weren't already the phenomenon strong enough to survive both Linux and Alan going to the Big Hacker House in the Sky, we wouldn't be here to talk about it. Also unfortunately unlike Trek Holodeck characters, these simulations wouldn't be quite as createive.
Yeah, and, if God had meant for Man to fly, we'd have been born with wings.
Who let the Luddites onto the 'net, Taco?
This is really pathetic. It sounds like they're patenting a sophiticated Eliza. If you want to preserve the memory of a relative, take pictures. It's a lot simpler and more dignified.
Imagine recording all your old girlfriends with such a device? Or buying the latest version of some hot Hollywood babe? Sounds like an interesting future we're headed for... Hmmm, now if only Nitrozac would release Nitrozac Live v. 1.0!
We should, that is to say we must, record every move that both Linus and Alan make so that Linux will live in the tragic event that, God forbid, they are hit by buses.
Frank Tipler already thought of this, although I dont think he seriously thought it would be "done" so soon. Its even obvious from the title of his book, "The Physics of Immortality : Modern Cosmology, God and the Resurection the Dead".
glasnost
(too lazy to think of witty tagline)
As much like Eliza as it is like a William Gibson novel. Is the USPTO so out of it that they can issue a patent for what has been in science fiction for a decade?
bugger.net | MunkAndPhyber.com
(Ergh, I'm too unawake to figure out how to get the spacing right...)
Start out with a line like this (in Perl, of course):
$choices = int(rand(50000));
The Bill Clinton function is something like this:
sub bill_clinton {
my $do = $choices % 3;
if ($do == 0) {
say("I did not have sex with that woman");
}
elsif ($do == 1) {
say("It depends on what the definition of
is is");
}
elsif ($do == 2) {
say("It's time to end the politics of personal
destruction");
}
}
Similarly, the Al Gore function is something like this:
sub al_gore {
my $do = $choices % 2;
if ($do == 0) {
say("I took the initiative in creating the
Internet");
}
elsif ($do == 1) {
say("Vote for me; I'm solid as an oak");
}
}
and so on...
10Brett-T
Oh, bother.
They had electronic personalities all over the place in those books. Unfortunately, I agree with the first poster, this is suckerware. Besides, it's more fun to try to bring them back to life with large doses of electricity =)
Theoretically if we ever gain a detailed understanding of the human brain and also create imaging technology sophisticated enough to analyze a complete state of a human brain this stuff might be feasible. Right now you're better off getting your head frozen (this also applies to people thinking of buying this program, not just the recently deceased).
Unbreakable toys can be used to break other toys.
Andy Garcia in Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead ran a company that videotaped answers of people who were near death. The summary says it best: "videotaping the terminally-ill, so that they will be around to give 'Afterlife Advice' to their survivors". (It was his day job, not the central point of the movie.) Good movie, by the way.
why would you want to violate the memory of a person you loved by trying to replicate their personality with a cheap piece of software?
There are some limits to what technology can do, and one of those is trying to take an emotionally charged memory and put it into a cold emotionless computer with a monotone Fred voice and have it say the things someone you loved used to say.
Sometimes you just have to ask why people can't leave well enough alone and stop making software that sucks (unlike bbedit).
This seems like a truly incosiderate idea. People who have lost someone close need to try and accept the loss and move on. Having a computer that can simulate the life is not the way to do that. In the long run it will just cause pain even if it does soften the blow over the short term.(although I doubt it could do that) We definitly need to stop using technology just because we can, it should be a means and not and end in itself.
I believe that I'll stick to the ol' camcorder for all my "communication". It might not be interactive but I don't need to have them talk back to remember them while watching the tape.
Good is never enough, when you dream of being great!
The Video Church of the Vu Age strikes again! Its fake, its phony, and it isn't going to go anywhere. Much like the Max Headroom episode you referenced. But it could pull some cache away from the gullible.
You patent inventions.
You copyright programs.
That's the way it should be, at least. The only saving grace is that I can think of at least two examples of prior art in fiction (Adamantium by L.E. Modestitt Jr. and Dirty Pair: Fatal but Not Serious) of computer programs of the dead, and I'm sure there's more. Patent reform must be coming, sooner or later...
Somewhat cool idea.. but when people are in the grieving process, I think this might tramatize them even more. Then again, it could be a better way of releasing a lot of stress by getting to say your 'final goodbye'.
However, maybe the legal system will be against this.. after all, you *could* record their voice saying they'll give you all this crap when they die after they have actually passed on.. this might sound far fetched but I'm sure you know someone who would love to do this.
Cheers to anyone who can be like Bette Midler and keep coming back when no-one wants them,
Matthew
_____________________________________
sortakinda.ca | canadian paraphrasing.
even ignoring the huge amounts of previous prior art, i wonder how this would be patentable anyway. I mean, aren't patents supposed to cover specific, nonobvious techniques? Whereas this is broad, vague, and obvious. How was this ever approved?
I'm beginning to sense that the patent people just hand out patents to everyone who asks, and assume that if someone is hurt by that patent, whoever it was will just happen to have the huge amount of money laying around to have a bogus patent struck down.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Modern marketing for morons:
1) Use the word "computer"
2) Use the word "virtual"
3) Use the word "internet"
Mix them as you like and sell something.
Example:
"Contact your virtual dead friends from your computer anywhere in the world using internet."
Yes, the world is full of stupid people, a good proof of that is the number of enterprises paying NT licences for file serving...
---------------------
"Chaos is ruled by a very well defined set of rules"
When the appropriate software is developed which can learn personality traits, how far away are we from AI? I have the feeling this would be closely related to AI. And that's kind of odd. I mean, it would be kind of cool to spawn an AI with my personality, but at the same time, I'd feel kind of guilty. Who am I to put all my insecurities and personality flaws (see what I mean?) on some AI's shoulders?
Plus, I myself would find it freaky that some AI would be so good at being me that I wouldn't know what I had or hadn't done/said/etc, which wouldn't be too hard, given how integrated the net is now, and how integrated it could get in the future.
The question for me isn't "Would we ever truly die then?" but rather: Would we ever truly live?
Sheesh, is my paranoid conspiratorialist streak showing or what?
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Straight ahead of him, nobody can go very far... -- Le P
I'd like to see this done to living people first of all. Comparing the output of the program and the actual person is the only way to see how well this works. Otherwise, and even in any case, it's just as bad as what soul channelers and the like do, except in this case, the people know they're not really talking to the dead person. Would such a device be used by the charlatans?
Undertakers are always looking for ways to cash in on grief. This is probably another scam like the audio/video headstone - press a button to watch a video documentary of the deceased person.
--Louis
As someone has already pointed out, this "invention" gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "Blue Screen of Death".
People may have a limited span, but I have yet to meet a computer system that has run continuously for eighty years or more. To ensure mutual longevity, it is a better idea for a human to memorize the behavior of a computer, rather than the other way around.
If only I'd patented that idea 50 years ago. I could claim to have invented the system administrator.
I didn't read the story, but it sounds a lot like the Sci-Fi short story, "Living Will" by Alexander Jablokov.
For those interested, you can find the story in the collection of short stories, "Hackers", Edited by Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois.
Enjoy the read!
It's the entire story in the short story "Living Will" by Alexander Jablokov.
Why does this thing deserve a patent? I can think of this thing showing up in science fiction in a number of places, including Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Voyager and several SF novels I have read. There was also a stupid scifi movie that I can't remember the name of, but it had Michael Dorn in it and it revolved around a guy who worked in a "virtual reality resort" thing of sorts. They brought back some old guy's old girlfriend from the dead. (I'm sure I could get the name of the movie from the imdb ... this is a cool site if you haven't checked it out: www.imdb.com (shameless plug))
Anyhow, fight software patents! They are stifling creativity!
My journal has hot
I know I am a little late on this one (vacation and all), but I have a little something to add.
I once wrote a program in Pick BASIC (which someday I want to convert to some other better suited language/system) that takes an input (a question, statement, anything), and compares it to a list of possible inputs (if no match is found, the user is told so, and can input a variety of possible responses for the keywords input). Based on keywords found, a percentage is created, the one with the highest percentage wins, and one of the responses is selected randomly to be displayed to the user. This is all well and good, but not only is the current input used to generate the percentages, the last few lines input by the user are also used (it has been a long time since I looked at the code, so I am not sure I am completely right on this), so that the "conversation" stays "on topic".
All in all, it can be quite fun to "talk" with the program - my intent originally was to create a form of an encyclopedia for discussion; rather than look up something by topic, the user could simply ask it questions about the subject, and it would answer. It then evolved into some form of an AI personality type project (or something like an expert system with randomness thrown in - not very good for an expert system). I also had plans for allowing it the ability to detect when/if the user was getting mad/happy/excited/upset/etc. and having different responses based on that.
In short, I have the original code - written about 3 years ago. Would this invalidate the patent? I am willing to GPL this code (or whatever it would take) if this might be the case...
Respond to this post if you are interested...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
"Mommy! Grandma bluescreened!"
Anyone read the "Chung Kuo" series written by David Wingrove? After the Chinese conquered the world, the Emperors had a device that kept track of all the memories and experiences from the previous generations. In short, they'd continue the ancestor worship by "capturing" the personality within a portrait that could speak to you...
:P That'd probably be more productive. ;)
Interesting idea for those into ancestor worship, but I can't find a "real world" application for this technology. Actually, I could try porting my pets.
This makes things uncomfortable at best when the actual engineer shows up to work with Geordie IRL in a later episode.
Does this Star Trek episode consitute prior art? I says "yes!".
Bravery, Kindness, Clarity, Honesty, Compassion, Generosity
...Nothing interesting here. Just move along...
... the ROM cartridge Case was carrying around...
...now I can't permanently KILL Bill Gates. DEATH is related to LICE, yes, LICE.
LICE.
Life is full of LICE.
Hair Eternal is full of Lice Eternal.
Etc.
adrec@internetcds.com
Aaron J. Shaver - aaronshaver@yahoo.com "Many people would rather die than think; in fact, most do." --Bertrand Russel
...this?
Sitting in the kitchen with Grandpa's hologram
'Though he has no substance he is still a great old man
Come on by and say hello any time you can
We'll be sitting in the kitchen with Grandpa's hologram
All comedy eventually comes true in some form. Read Mad magazine from the 1950's if you don't believe me.
--
Some keywords for the NSA in the Lord of the Rings universe: One Ring bind find Sauron quest Nazgul freedom
Specific technology aside, but let's look at this thing with an eye towards the future. What happens when the appropriate software is developed that can learn personality traits? What happens when it can use those personality traits in new situations? Can you imagine that? If the program was so good it could have conversations in your absence. Would we ever truly die then? I understand we still have a long, long way to go before we understand how our brains functions, but once we do what is to prevent brain functionality from being "ported" to a computer?
There is so much prior art to this. First thing that comes to mind is Rimmer from Red Dward. A computer recreation of a dead person. All this is is a cheap AI program that simulates an actual person. I've written cheezy programs in the past like this that simulate me or a friend. I'm sure just about every programmer has tried writting such a program at one time in their life when extremely bored.
I haven't read any of the other posts, but the first thought that comes to my mind is: this is so fucking stupid, why did you even bring it up? It's almost as bad as a Jon Katz article!
Seriously, we apreciate what you guys at Slashdot do, but can't you learn a little bit of self filtering? Didn't it occur to you rather quickly that this has absolutely nothing to do with bringing people back from the dead or artificial life?
This is equivalent to patenting a process to put your deceased relatives face on a marionette. Yippee! Yehaw!!! Tell you what: you pay me $100 and I'll put a tatoo of your dead mother on my ass. Look, when my ass moves, your mother moves! Artificial life, not.
There is a sucker born every minute. The next thing you know, you'll claim Microsoft is in cahoots with the NSA...
Actually, this was a minor point in a short story by Frank Herbert entitled A-W-F Unlimited... a company called IBMasoleum recorded dead people's brain patterns to do the same thing, pretty much.
Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book.
--Cicero
What about that episode when Rimmer swapped bodys with Lister? (and then later with the cat) ;P Maybe we could bring dead people back to life! ;p Once we invent that mind swap technology that is.
Anyone see any parallels to Red Dwarf's Rimmer? The guy died, but everything about him, memories, personality, self-awareness, stuff like that, was pumped into a hologram--his functionality was kept "alive" via computer...much to the chagrin of everyone else on board.
Sure, it might be cheesy science fiction, but it's just another example of how stuff like this doesn't work.
It also sounds highly disrespectful. I might not mind being "reincarnated" like this(Does it have Linux support? Please? Please?) because I'm a little bit sick and twisted that way...
But I know no one else who'd want to have their memories tarnished by this.
I just think it's a little sick. C'mon, people, LIVE your lives.
Can't sleep, the clowns will eat me...
There was a service in which people would purchase robotic flying robots to record them so that their descendants could watch random bits of their lives.
You'd have to be able to not only simulate a brain in software (in realtime as well), but you'd have to be able to "sample" somebody's brain state to get a snapshot of who/what they are in order to simulate it.
If we were hypothetically able to pass those barriers then I don't see what anybody could do to prevent it being done. The idea of immortality is just too appealing to assume that somebody with resources wouldn't do it (myself included, minus resources).
As far as "dying", I think it could be said that we would technically die when our bodies did. Just because a copy of us goes on does not eliminate the death of our biological self. The fact that some aspect of our personality lives on separately from our biological self would undoubtedly cause a host of social issues, and not only post mortem.
Fortunately or unfortunately this is all probably not much of an issue. I suspect that we'll have biological immortality long before we come close to an electronic variant. Makes for some interesting fiction though.
Unbreakable toys can be used to break other toys.
I think Frederick Pohl preceded Tipler by about ten years with the "dead men" of "Heechee Rendezvous" and the other Heechee books. There may be earlier precedent in Sci-Fi, but I can't think of any at the moment.
Yeah, but Tipler presents it seriously, not as sci-fi. For anyone who doesn't know, Tipler calls his idea the "Omega Point Theory". Main point being we'll all be "resurrected" as emulations at the end of the universe. If it sounds goofy that's because it is, but it's interesting nonetheless.David Deutsch also discusses Tipler's theory in his book "The Fabric of Reality", if anyone cares to read more about it.
William Gibson had something like these which he coined "ROM constructs" in _Neuromancer_ and _Mona Lisa Overdrive_, and I think these guys are full of shit. I doubt they could have anything that would pass a Turing Test, as they are essentially claiming that they can make an AI that responds the same as grandma.
-AC