I wrote this article about a year ago for MISC Magazine and really want more people to read it… just don’t tell my mom about it.
A cursory search of the mighty internet will reveal that I am far from the first person to write about this topic. In fact, in addition to countless books, articles, videos (ew), video games (double-ew), and preachy religious websites, this past November even saw theFirst International Congress on Love and Sex with Robots (edit: we’re fast approaching the Second International Congress!) featuring such panels and presentations as “robot emotions,” “intelligent sex hardware,” and my personal favourite, “teledildonics.” While there is a lot of noise, frightening imagery, and confusion around the topic, one thing that most people agree on – except the religious extremists – is that love and sex with robots will eventually be commonplace, and likely in our lifetime. Hell, even Joaquin Phoenix fell in love with an AI – though admittedly, he may not be the best example to prove my point.
Pun completely intended, there are two ways to approach this topic: top-down (love) or bottom-up (sex).
Interestingly, the first instance of the concept of robotic love actually dates back to the first ever use of the term “robot.” In Karel Čapek’s 1920 play R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots), artificial beings revolt against their creators; the play ends with a male and female robot falling in love and inheriting the earth. However, when it comes to interspecies erotica, the first instance of human-robot love – to my knowledge – was in Lester del Rey’s 1938 short story “Helen O’Loy.” The plot tells of two young men who modify a household robot to develop emotions. Helen, the robot, falls in love with one of the men who initially resists her but ultimately marries her. They grow old together and only in the story’s finale is it revealed that both men were actually in love with her all along.
Since these early works, countless pieces have been written by sci-fi authors over the years detailing robots developing emotions and falling in love with their engineering creators or vice-versa (and yes, the engineers also had to develop emotions). One of my personal favourites is William Gibson’s Idoru, where an aging rock star falls in love with a bodiless synthetic personality (artificial intelligence) and much hilarity and drama ensues. Gibson’s novel deals with many of the major themes you would expect: ethics, social stigma, misunderstanding, peer judgment, and the belief that our rock star, Rez, has lost his mind.
David Levy, arguably the foremost authority on the topic, even wrote a practical, and disturbingly thorough book on the topic detailing the cultural history of our fascination with robots and some of the far-reaching implications. In Love and Sex with Robots,he views our potential love of robots and AI as an extension of the affection people show towards their pets, phones, vehicles, or other non-human constructs. Like Gibson, Levy naturally acknowledges that this is all a bit weird and at least initially, will come with a certain layer of social stigma and judgment. However, he draws on historical examples such as oral sex, masturbation, and homosexuality to cite instances where public perception has gradually shifted towards acceptance in the initial face of outcry.
Regardless, if we push all that dull ethics and stigma stuff to the side for a moment and run with the premise of artificial sentience – that we will one day create robots capable of emotion – then isn’t the idea of people falling in love with robots not only plausible, but pretty much inevitable? A truly sentient AI should, in theory, be indistinguishable from human intelligence and therefore, falling in love with a robot should really be no different from falling in love with a person. Even if we haven’t quite perfected the hardware, one only need to look to the wedding parties in World of Warcraft or Second Life to realize that recent tech generations aren’t too bothered by the lack of physical form.
Yet, physicality is a part of love that shouldn’t be ignored and what fun would this article be if we didn’t get a bit mechanically depraved? First, to anyone who feels as though the idea of having sex with a machine is ignoble and disgusting, I’ll only briefly point to the multi-billion dollar global vibrator industry to highlight that we as a society seem to have no qualms about fucking machines. Granted, particularly in the early, unrefined days, the experience of sex with a physical robot may be more than a touch awkward and require a stretch of the imagination. However, we human beings seem to have few limits on what we can both imagine and accomplish, particularly when it comes to matters of the bedroom.
As you might have guessed, efforts to date largely serve the male market. You may have also guessed that the current leaders in this technology are coming out of Japan. While I would love to chat design points and engineering specifications for such marvels as the AutoBlow2, Fleshlight Vstroker, Machine Gun Happiness Browser, or Fuckzilla – and yes, these all exist (edit: but I’m not linking to any of them… because) – I’m going to focus in on the progression of Tenga: a Japanese company trying to define the future of masturbation. Beyond simply the main cylindrical unit, which Tenga claims that their “active detailed textures” are the most advanced on the market, the system integrates a Novint Falcon to move the cylinder and help simulate motion around the tube. Moreover, they have created a cartoon-virtual environment and, using an Oculus Rift, are able to essentially immerse the user in a VR cartoon porn with them as the male co-star. I’d describe the system further, however, it’s near impossible to do knowing that my family reads these articles and there are some hilarious videos on the internet of nerds getting mechanical handjobs at tech conferences that I’d rather you see for yourself.
So this is happening already and we can assume it will only get better (worse?). In theory, there are some great benefits to the prospect of robotic sex. It would be tremendously safe from an infection standpoint (though I won’t comment on the risk of mechanical failure). It could decrease levels of prostitution in both adults and children (though the thoughts of what robotic fantasies a child molester may envision make me want to crawl out of my skin). It would reduce complications of emotion, intimacy and sexual anxiety (you’re welcome, teenage boys). And of course, since it’s all about you, robotic sex would become a veritable home run derby of orgasms (but the romantic in me does feel there is something very sad about the concept of being able to program the “perfect orgasm”).
Of course, there is a catch to our robotic lovers: babies. While many of the darkest corners of our bedrooms and minds may have forgotten that the evolutionarily intended function of sex is procreation, the fact remains: the reason you get that special feeling when you look at a swell gal or fella is, in the strictest of biological senses, because your subconscious is trying to pass on its genetic code and continue the species. Yet, until we invent artificial fallopian tubes that pop out digital ovum or robotic testes capable of mass-scale production of cyber-sperm – each of which can fuse with human gametes to create some blasphemous homo-robo zygote – we might as well be shooting our loads into a sock.
And we need only look to the declining nation of Japan to see the effects of reduced birth rate. To be fair, Japan’s lackluster interest in babies has to do with strict social codes and a backlash against traditional marriage, and not the excessive fetishisation of technology (I was as surprised as you). However, the nation is already beginning to see the effects around the country. Reports have hypothesized the disappearance of smaller towns, the shrinking of national workforce, a risk of economic collapse, and in extreme scenarios, the extinction of an entire nation and culture.
These types of impacts outline a fairly solid counterpoint to the “if it feels good, do it” argument of robo-love and suddenly make the idea of falling in love with an AI, or buying the world’s greatest sexbot seem pretty selfish – if it means potentially contributing to the downfall of mankind. I’m not about to close this article by siding with the religious extremists, but from a purely long-term economic standpoint, maybe the sexbot community needs to consider designing for artificial polygamy or robotic three-ways.