2021/01/25 by Joshua Hurtado Hurtado · 2 citations
Psychology · #Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health #Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion #Body Image and Dysmorphia Studies #Immortality #Personhood #Sociology #Agency (philosophy) #Persona #Epistemology #Aesthetics #Social science #Philosophy #Humanities #Theology
paper · pdf · doi:10.1080/13576275.2021.1878349
openalex publication_date 2021/01/25 · openalex created_date 2021/02/01 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/08
Research about digital immortality has grown in recent years, predominantly focusing on either the social effects of forms of digital immortalisation or on the available technologies. Few studies, however, adopt a clear sociological focus that remains attentive to the ontological dimension of digital immortality. Adopting a future-oriented perspective, this article contributes to the sociological study of digital immortality by introducing the concept of the Virtual Deceased Person (VDP), a speculative artefact that convincingly simulates the mannerisms and character traits of a deceased person, allowing them to operate as social actors posthumously and preserve the human social bond. The article draws on anthropological and microsocial theory to characterise the VDP as a persona of the dead given agency and embodiment by future thanatechnologies. By positioning the concept within the digital immortality discourse and expanding the scope of the social bond to the study of digital immortality, I portray the VDP as a manifestation of posthumous personhood, arguing that it might facilitate preserving the social bond between the living and the dead throughout its creation process and its reintegration into the world of the living. I further discuss its implications for the emergence of a postmortal society of socially active, virtualised ancestors.