Living Forever (Sort Of): AI Clones, Digital Ghosts, and the Problem with Perfection | A Carbon, a Silicon, and a Cell walk into a bar... | A Redefining Society Podcast Series With Recurring Guest Dr. Bruce Y. Lee
What if you could live forever — sort of? In this episode, Bruce Y. Lee and I meet at our usual bar to explore digital immortality, algorithmic relationships, and what makes a person… well, a person. Star Trek, deepfakes, AI therapists, and dead celebrities all make an appearance. Is it still you if your clone outlives you? Let’s talk.
The ITSPmagazine Podcast · ITSPmagazine Redefining Society, Marco Ciappelli, Dr. Bruce Y Lee
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Show Notes
Guest: Dr. Bruce Y Lee
Senior Contributor @Forbes | Professor | CEO | Writer/Journalist | Entrepreneur | Digital & Computational Health | #AI | bruceylee.substack.com | bruceylee.com
Bruce Y. Lee, MD, MBA is a writer, journalist, systems modeler, AI, computational and digital health expert, professor, physician, entrepreneur, and avocado-eater, not always in that order.Executive Director of PHICOR (Public Health Informatics, Computational, and Operations Research) [@PHICORteam]
On LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/bruce-y-lee-68a6834/
Website | https://www.bruceylee.com/
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Host: Marco Ciappelli, Co-Founder at ITSPmagazine [@ITSPmagazine] and Host of Redefining Society Podcast
Visit Marco's website 👉 https://www.marcociappelli.com
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This Episode’s Sponsors
BlackCloak 👉 https://itspm.ag/itspbcweb
We’re back at the bar. Bruce is here, the garlic took the day off (too young to drink?), and we’re talking about something that’s not science fiction anymore — the idea that your digital self could outlive you.
Yeah. Living forever. Or at least… being replicated forever.
It starts with a hologram of Princess Leia and ends with people in Japan marrying bots. And in between? There’s a messy, fascinating, unsettling space filled with AI companions, algorithmic flattery, uncanny valley doppelgängers, and the very real possibility that we’re confusing memory with simulation.
Bruce brings up Star Trek — of course he does — where Captain Kirk debates a machine version of a long-dead friend who insists he’s still the real deal. Spoiler: Kirk says no. And I get it. But what if that machine knows everything I’ve ever posted, recorded, written, liked, said, or searched? What if it feels like me?
Would you want to talk to it?
As always, our conversation doesn’t offer a final answer — we’re not here to draw lines in the philosophical sand. We’re here to hold up a mirror and ask: is that reflection still you if it’s built out of pixels and training data?
This episode is personal and playful, but also incredibly relevant. Because we’re already building legacies we don’t fully understand. Every photo, every search, every rant, every laugh — it’s all on the record now. Our historical memory is no longer dusty boxes in the attic; it’s a neural net waiting to be queried.
So yeah, one day, you might be sipping your espresso while a synthetic version of your late uncle offers you advice, cracks a joke, and asks if you still listen to that one podcast.
Just remember what Captain Kirk said: that might look like him, sound like him, even think like him — but it’s not really him.
Still… it’s a hell of a conversation.
So join Bruce and me. Pull up a virtual stool. It’s Season 2, Episode 3. And no, that laugh you just heard isn’t AI-generated — not yet.
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Keywords:
digital immortality, AI relationships, uncanny valley, chatbot therapy, synthetic identity, Star Trek, brain uploading, holograms, emotional AI, algorithmic intimacy, digital clone, memory simulation, techno-sociology, posthumanism, virtual consciousness, AI ethics, social engineering, digital legacy, artificial friends, future of identity
See You Next Time
You'll find links to connect with Bruce and explore his incredible contributions in journalism and medicine. I promise you; he's just as insightful and entertaining as he seems in the series. So, see you next time – same bar, same garlic, new topics!
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Resources/References
The Singularity Is Nearer: When We Merge with AI
by Ray Kurzweil
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