Is this a needed way to understand and learn what being a humanitarian means? To understand the plight of refugees, sure we cannot easily speak with them, but do we needed an artificial persona?
Go ask Amina.
Amina is a woman living in the overcrowded Metche refugee camp in Chad, where she represents one of over a million Sudanese refugees fleeing the conflict in Darfur. Her digital replica, “Ask Amina,” is designed to provide realistic insights into the daily challenges and urgent needs faced by displaced people, such as water and food shortages. This synthetic “persona” may potentially enable humanitarian workers to better understand the lived experiences of refugees, using data curated from local surveys, cultural artifacts, and community knowledge.
Apparently one has to register, to give up personal identifying information, to ask Amina.
I only read of this a few hours ago from 404 Media-- The UN Made AI-Generated Refugees - where we can see some videos of a sample intreraction.
I am talking to Amina, an AI avatar that plays the role of a woman living in a refugee camp in Chad after she escaped violence in Sudan. “I’m hanging in there, yeah,” Anima tells me. “ It’s tough here in the camp, but we’re staying strong.” I ask her how she came to be in a refugee camp. “I fled my hometown of Al Junaynah in Sudan back in June 2023, due to the violence, yeah?” It says. “It was a terrifying journey to escape the conflict. Now I’m trying to keep my kids safe and find some stability here in the camp. It’s not easy but we have to keep going, right?”
Perhaps it is true to the actual situations refugees face and “may” (there are many “mays” in the descriptions) lead to better understanding.
I ask to hear what people here think of this, not to throw stones (well maybe a few small plush pebbles). Has anyone tried this or other AI personas? Beyond the “neat factor” or that technically this is done, is this the road we should be on?
Over to you, OEG Connect.
