Sexbots

Written December, 2013

fembot_by_stephen_wheeler

The infrastructure (and presumably the technology) exists to create a robot with synthetic skin and artificial intelligence capable of learning owners’ preferences. Perhaps the most interesting part of the “sexbot” phenomenon is that bot prototypes are not limited to sexual uses, but designed to express love and affection and develop a vocabulary suited to the buyer’s interests. Obvious issues that accompany the introduction of such robots include: changing norms and values in human interaction; the possible formation of social bonds or exclusive sexual relationships with robots; sex addiction; transference of expectations from robot relationships to human relationships (including issues of dominance, behavioral expectations, and consent); the further commodification of sex; attachment issues. Advocates say that sexbots can help curb prostitution, sex crimes, and the spread of STDs.

Earlier this year, a Pew report on robots, “A.I., Robotics, and the Future of Jobs,” included a line by Stowe Boyd (one of 1900 people interviewed for the report), the lead researcher for Gigaom Research, who said that by 2025, “Robotic sex partners will be commonplace, although the source of scorn and division,” but that sexbots will viewed by some in the same way that we currently “bemoan selfies as an indicator of all that’s wrong with the world.” Whether or not that’s true, it certainly caused a media frenzy and started a discussion about the future and ethics of sex with robots.

Resources:

Love-‘bots: Future Robots Could Become Ideal Lovers, Experts Say (IEET)

Human-Robot Relations: Why We Should Worry (Live Science)

I (Robot) Thee Wed (Slate)

The Human Screwfly Solution (USA Today)

Sex Bots, Robo-Maids, And Other Sci-Fi Myths Of The Coming Robot Economy (Popular Science)

Sexbot Slaves (Aeon Magazine)

maria_from_the_film_metropolis_on_display_at_the_robot_hall_of_fame

Prostitution Will Survive the Rise of the Sexbots (Vice)

Sexbots Could Replace Realistic Love Dolls By 2025(International Business Times)

Is It Possible to Degrade and Exploit Your At-Home Sexbot?(Pacific Standard Magazine)

Raunchy Robotics: The Ethics of Sexbots (Human Centered Robotics blog)

Sex With Robots, the Moral and Legal Implications (UM Today)

Sexbots for Women (IEET)

Should Pedophiles Be Allowed To Use Child Sexbots? (iO9)

How Would Robotic Prostitutes Change the Sex Tourism Industry? (iO9)

9 Percent of Americans Say They’d Bonk A Sexbot (Popular Science)

Poll Finds 1 in 5 People Would Have Sex With a Robot (The Daily Beast)

We Might All Be Having Sex With Robots Soon (Salon)

“I Believe That It Will Become Perfectly Normal for People to Have Sex With Robots” (Newsweek)

In the Future, We Will All Pay to Have Sex With Robots (Jezebel)

The Murky World of Robot Sex and Consent (Wired UK)

Book Review: Love and Sex with Robots (NYT)

Are Child Sex-Robots Inevitable? (Forbes)

Humans Marrying Robots? A Q&A with David Levy (Scientific American)