Thanabots, fantasy, and the ethics of mourning

Thanabots—digital recreations of the dead powered by artificial intelligence (AI)—comprise media that allow the dead to remain present in the world of the living. In this article we unpack the psychic dimension of users’ diverse stances towards thanabots, asking how this dimension can contribute to our understanding of the patterns of users’ responses to loss. Drawing on Critical Fantasy Studies, we examine journalistic reports featuring actual users and original interviews with potential users, treating thanabots as sites of affective investment. We argue that users affectively invest in their interactions with thanabots insofar as the latter embody aspects of the dead that carry symbolic value and significance. The concepts of fantasy, mourning, and part-object are deployed to identify two modes of user engagement with thanabots, one where their relationship to the dead is reified and one where users reflexively and ethically engage with the ideas and emotions associated with the dead. We conclude with a discussion about the prospect of establishing conditions of possibility for an ‘ethics of mourning’ as regards user–thanabot interactions.