Klara and the Sun

 

i recently read a book about an artificial intelligence who is purchased to become the friend of a little girl named Josie. 

The friend is programmed to do all sorts of things, but it views the world through its own experiences and limitations, which isn't really too different from the way we view things.

Eventually the friend realizes that it is there to help Josie die, or fade away in the words of the AI. Since she is powered by the sun, she has come to think of the sun as God and begins to try and persuade this God to favor Josie so she won't fade so quickly.

The book speaks to me on so many levels as I begin to fade. 

All things end, even AIs when their batteries no longer charge, but it becomes more personal as the end draws near. It doesn't matter whether we live to twenty or a hundred. We tend to try more extreme things as we become more desperate, or witness someone we love fading fast.

But in the end it is all futile, so most of us pretend there won't be an end until that becomes impossible. And in the interim we also develop eccentricities and pretend belief systems that help us deal with all the other things we have no control over.