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Immortality, Resurrection and Augmented Reality

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MAXIME AUBERT / PA WIRE

In a cave on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, a swarm of wild pigs and dwarf buffalo are hunted by a tribe of human-like figures with elongated faces and animal-like muzzles. At least, that’s what the archaeologists believe is happening in the oldest story ever recorded.

At 43,900 years old, this cave painting makes us a participant in the very thing that makes us human — telling stories. Perhaps it was a depiction of life back then or more likely a description of a spiritual belief, the first signs of religion. As the lead archaeologist, Maxime Aubert, researching this cave puts it,

“The ability to invent fictional stories may have been the last and most crucial stage in the evolutionary history of human language and development of modern-like pattern of cognition.”

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Yet, I think there is an even greater importance to this ancient painting. It shows that even our earliest ancestors had the desire to transcend themselves. Which story would be worthy of being etched into the cave well to be remembered for as long as rock lives? These ancient peoples recorded their story on an inter-dimensional cave wall, which immortalized their existence throughout time. We know about these ancient peoples because of the stories they told. They have a presence today, nearly 44,000 years later, because of the memories they recorded.

But what is memory? And when does a memory begin? Does it live where the memory happened or does memory exist beyond that space?

I traveled to Denmark recently to visit my grandparents’ house, who have both passed some years ago. The house they built still remains, but soon this house will be raized by its current owner. The last physical relic of my grandparents’ legacy will be torn down and a lifetime of memories buried with it. I’ve found myself sentimental at the thought of this space — housing my formative memories of Denmark — to forever be removed. It was in this house where I first experienced Denmark and what it means to be Danish. It was in this house where I have my own memories of my Danish grandparents. When their house is ripped down, where will these memories go?

While on this trip to Denmark, I used my drone to make a photogrammetry model of the house. Then, I built an augmented reality experience where I can see the model of their home in front of me, using a smartphone. Where memories typically occupy a specific space, now these memories can occupy any space. The experiences I have in my grandparents’ house are now untethered from their physical locale and can exist as memories immortalized through augmented reality.

Even though memories can be etched into a cave wall or preserved through 3D modeling, memory is still ephemeral in the sense that it isn’t an objective record of experience but more an evolving perspective. The cave paintings have meaning to us thousands of years later. The house is the anchor of my Danish memories now that my grandparents are gone. Memory grows as new experiences and information — context — are added, further distancing the original experience from the event the memory itself references. But perhaps this is how memory achieves immortality. The understanding of the past lives in the memory of the present. Memory is always living in the now.

My late paternal grandmother and I only shared the same space for my first two years of life. I don’t remember the memories we created together, but I’m sure she does. I compiled all the video documenting the memories we had together. 28 years later, my late grandmother is resurrected from her grave through augmented reality. Her digital ghost, an immortal version of her existance, rises out of the ground and presents the memories we shared. Once again, we occupy the same physical space, her in the ground and me standing by her grave. We relive those limited memories in a liminal space where time and presence are folded together. Because of augmented reality, my late grandmother is more alive to me now than she has ever been.

I have only one biological grandparent still living — my paternal grandfather. This year he turns 90 and will be exactly 3x my age. When I see my grandfather, it feels a lot like looking at myself in the future. What will be my legacy? Am I happy? Am I sad? Which memories will I have when I’m 90? These are the questions I’d want to ask myself, so I decided to ask my grandfather the same ones.

Using DepthKit and the Azure Kinect, I made a volumetric capture of my grandfather. Volumetric video is like video, but with captured depth data. Instead of just a flat 2D video, the imprint of my grandfather is captured as well. The result is a 3D video with volume, a literal hologram, that fills physical space. Using augmented reality, I can place the hologram in any context and feel my grandfather’s presence as he recounts his memories. I asked him what about his earliest memory, a time when he felt happy, a time he felt sad and how we wants to be remembered. These questions, to me, feel like the essence of a hologram which is an embodiment of memory. The hologram of my grandfather becomes a digital vessel for his physical presence. It’s like his soul, if the soul consists of memory as its elemental material. When my grandfather does pass, I will have these extracted memories and I will be to see them in my immediate space. The materiality of his memory will persist digitally in a physical dimension. He will be permanently present — even immortal — through this volumetric capture. His hologram can tell me about his earliest memory right in my living room. His hologram can tell me about a time when he felt happy and even how he wants to be remembered. My grandfather will be resurrected through a digital vessel of himself.

Holograms are a juxtaposition of humanity. My grandfather’s hologram cannot be my grandfather, yet it is still the immortal embodied memory of him nonetheless. The hologram is captured depth from a previous time, which occupies the physicality of the present. The hologram gives life to those who have passed, yet is the act of defying death that makes the hologram trespass on the human condition. This isn’t a flaw in the volumetric capture medium; rather, it is a paradox of memory. We live to make memories, and we must die for them to become a memory.

What is life if it isn’t to be remembered? We share the same desire as did those ancient inhabitants on the island of Sulawesi. They carved their stories into the cave wall for the memory of their civilization and existence to transcend the limits of their physical bodies. They practiced the most basic form of augmented reality. Their story imbues a space with memory and grants these inhabitants immortality. We are entering a new evolutionary stage as we use augmented reality to immortalize a frame of life, a dead portion of ourselves, to live beyond our bodies. Augmented reality evolves the physical limit on our humanity. Now, our memories can be resurrected in any space or context without the need to be etched into a cave wall.

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Immortality, Resurrection and Augmented Reality was originally published in AR/VR Journey: Augmented & Virtual Reality Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

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Source: https://arvrjourney.com/immortality-resurrection-and-augmented-reality-ac579596089?source=rss—-d01820283d6d—4

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