Over a decade ago, the science fiction series Black Mirror showed a story about using artificial intelligence to bring back loved ones. Thanks to technological advancement, the latest AI technology brings hope of recreating loved ones through virtual form.

Recently, it was revealed that renowned musician Tino Bao had created a digital version of his daughter, who in 2021 passed away due to a rare disease at the age of 22. With the help of Xiaoice, Microsoft Asia’s AI branch based in China, Bao was able to recreate his daughter Bao Rong as an AI-powered virtual figure. Tino Bao, his family and the team went to great lengths to piece together pictures, audio-visual recordings, and narrated memories of Rong. After thousands of trials and errors, they presented the life-like digital human who speaks in both Mandarin and English. Bao has finally launched a company to bring the technological miracle to other families experiencing such loss.

However, this technological achievement has also been accompanied by many controversies. The idea of bringing back a loved one through AI may seem comforting. Still, researchers caution that constantly interacting with an AI version of a deceased loved one could potentially affect the natural grieving process, leaving individuals stuck in a state of denial. This could lead to prolonged grief and other mental health issues. Furthermore, there’s a risk that people may become overly dependent on the technology, prioritizing their interactions with the AI version over forming new, real-life relationships.

With the case of Bao Rong out in the open, AI resurrection (复活) has become a business. From simple “talking pictures” that sound nothing like the loved ones to deep fake videos of actors speaking with the faces of those who passed away, the lower end of the market is more “artificial” than “intelligent”. Therefore, it is crucial to establish proper regulations and ethical standards to ensure that the use of AI-resurrection technology is safe and responsible.

On Christmas Eve, two little ducks were found frozen on a pond in Smithville, Ohio. They flapped their wings, fruitlessly struggling to free themselves on the ice until two locals spotted them and helped set the animals free. The two ducks were later named Olaf and Elsa, characters from Disney’s Frozen, and sent to an animal rescue organization.

“Every year in springtime, particularly at Easter, many people buy ducklings on impulse as gifts, often for their kids. People associate baby animals like ducklings, chicks, and bunnies with springtime,” says John Di Leonardo, an anthrozoologist. “But months later, animal rescuers routinely see a rise in abandoned ducks in local parks and ponds.”

Elsa and Olaf’s tough situation highlights the reason why domestic ducks always show up in local parks and ponds. Assuming they can live, their case is pretty similar to going to Yellowstone National Park and seeing a wolf and such like. “Oh, if this wolf can live well, my dog can do too,” says Adison Smith, president of Wasatch Wanderers Animal Rescue. “Those ducks lack hunting instincts, and many quickly starve to death or fall sick. A majority cannot fly because of small wings. They don’t migrate, so they can’t survive winter. They’re literally sitting ducks for predators (捕食者),” John Di Leonardo adds.

Since the issue is largely due to a lack of awareness, Adison Smith has started a campaign and hung more than 50 signs in a dozen cities to remind parkgoers that getting rid of pet ducks tends to be disastrous to them and can be illegal by the state law, “Our goal is to get the problem at its source,” Adison says. Most people tend to buy ducklings at stores for less than a dollar each, or kids take them home from school hatching projects.

“Though most abandoned ducks live short, miserable lives, Olaf and Elsa are an exception — they’ll spend their remaining days at Lasa Sanctuary in Wooster, Ohio, in a shelter with other ducks, clean hay, and protection against predators,” John Di Leonardo says.

“Many rules of bee society—from collective and individual interactions to raising healthy young bees—are adjusted by temperature, so we take advantage of that for this study,” explains Rafael Barmak, first author of a paper published recently.

“Previous studies on the thermal (heat-related) behavior of honeybees in winter have relied on observing the bees or controlling the outside temperature,” adds Martin Stefanec of the University of Graz. Now, scientists have developed a robotic system that can be built into a honeybee hive (蜂箱), which enables scientists to change the temperature from within the colony (蜂群), copy the thermal behavior of bees there, and study how the winter colony actively adjusts its temperature.

It’s challenging to study bees in winter since they are sensitive to cold, and opening their hives risks harming them. But thanks to the robotic system, scientists were able to study three experimental hives located at the Artificial Life Lab in Austria, while controlling them from a public research university in Switzerland. Inside the device, a central processor organized the sensors, which created a quick picture of the bees’ collective behavior, sent commands to the actuators (制动器) and passed on data to the scientists. That demonstrated the system could be used to study bees without entering the hives or without even cameras.

By gathering data on the bees’ position and creating warmer areas in the hive, scientists could encourage bees to move around in ways they would never normally do in nature during winter when bees tend to gather together to conserve energy. For example, scientists could direct bees colony toward a food source or discourage it from dividing into too small groups, which could threaten its survival.

The scientists were able to prolong the existence of a colony following the death of its queen by distributing heat energy via the actuators. Bees are one of the most important pollinators (传粉者), and their survivability has become a growing environmental and food security concern as pollinators’ global populations have declined.