Intelligent robots have had a place in our imagination for generations. Remember Gort from The Day the Earth Stood Still and Robbie the Robot from Lost in Space? Robbie was a benevolent machine, and Gort would hurt no one unless Klaatu told him to. Then we made an anthropomorphic leap, to androids. In Sleeper, we’re introduced to android servants, and in Star Wars, we meet C3PO, the fretful android translator. They are friendly, and funny. But in Blade Runner and The Terminator, we see their opposites, killer androids. Both helpful and dangerous androids are still with us, and in recent years a third type has emerged: androids as objects of love and sex.
In A. I. Artificial Intelligence, Henry and Monica Swinton’s young son, Martin, is near death in a cryo-chamber. One day Henry, who works at a science institute, surprises Monica by bringing home David, an android boy. Monica overcomes her ambivalent feelings and bonds with David, mainly because he’s so realistic and adorable. It’s genuine maternal love.
Unexpectedly, Martin awakens from his coma and is restored to the Swintons. He doesn’t like his android sibling and sabotages David’s relationship with his parents by making him out to be dangerous. In a wrenching scene, Monica abandons David in the woods to fend for himself. That’s when the main story—David’s attempts to reconnect with his mother—begins.
Early in his wanderings, David meets Gigolo Joe, a “love android,” a machine that specializes in seducing and gratifying a flesh and blood human. Jude Law plays the role of seducer brilliantly. His sexuality overwhelms Patricia, a client. I believe this is the first time a movie showed a human desiring an android.
Last year, Uncanny portrayed a human-android sexual relationship from meeting to consummation. The plot is based on a deception. Joy, a reporter with a scientific bent, visits a computing company to interview David, a reclusive genius whose specialty is building androids with an uncanny resemblance to humans. He introduces Joy to his latest creation, Adam, ostensibly an android. To all appearances, Adam is human. He displays a full range of emotions.
Marveling at David’s genius, Joy warms to his kind attentions. At the end of her assignment, they have sex. When Adam finds out, he flies into a rage and wrestles David to the ground. David breaks free and runs away, with Joy close behind. But it’s no good. Something in David has broken and he appears to die. In the next scene, we see Adam operating on David. It becomes clear that Adam is the real David, and the broken body is that of an android: Joy has unwittingly had sex with a machine. In the final scene, we see Joy looking at the readout of a pregnancy-test wand. The look of shock on her face tells us what she’s learned.
But these stories are just fantasy, right? Well, yes, for now. For human-android relationships to become a reality, three conditions must be met. First, androids have to become lifelike and anatomically complete, to our eyes and to our touch. Second, they have to seem intelligent. I think the baseline should be the ability to make the case for Donald Trump as our next president. (Wait… we’ve already seen androids do that.) Third, in the human brain, something has to ignite. It may be the stirring of affection, or perhaps just plain lust.
Where are we with the first condition? Consider today’s dolls, some of which have an almost frightening realism. A good example is Exhibit A, the Amazing Amanda doll, a sellout on Amazon. She comes with simplistic A.I., changes her facial expression, and plays with her toys.
Exhibit B is the picture at the left. I imagine that in a decade or two, the realism will be breathtaking (or perhaps I should say, more breathtaking). Our expertise with faces is already far along. Take a look at Sophia.
To evaluate the second condition, perceived intelligence, think of Siri, Cortana, and Alexa, the high-tech assistants we have now. They do a poor job of sustaining a real conversation, but they’ve been around for only a short time. Give them a decade or two and imagine what they’ll grow into.
Last, condition three: arousal. Turns out there’s a study on the subject, conducted by Stanford researchers. They found that touching a robot in “off-limits” places increased skin conductance, a sign of arousal. The participants also showed signs of discomfort when touching these places. Neither of these reactions was present when they touched other parts of the robot.
That’s all well and good, but I don’t think research is necessary. Mere awareness of everyday human activity tells us that humans can be aroused by androids. I recently had a conversation with a stranger in a doctor’s waiting room on this subject. His opinion: “A man will copulate with anything, even a knothole.”
I can hear a female voice saying, “Well sure, that’s men for you, but women are much less sexually perverse.” I agree, but not much less, just less. A study at Tufts University asked for the opinions of 100 men and women on the subject of “robot sex.” The researchers used a 7-point scale, with 7 meaning Most Appropriate. On the question of whether a realistic appearance mattered, men had an average score of 6.5; women, 5.2. One of the greatest disparities in scores came from a question about the appropriateness of sex robots resembling celebrities. My guess is that women particularly dislike the idea of a man possessing a “trophy robot.”
The Tufts study opens a door on what a world of sex androids (that is, anthropomorphic robots) might be like. Should they be used to treat perverts? As sex therapists in general? To replace a deceased spouse? As an alternative to a human partner? To complete a menage a trois? The mind reels at the possibilities. Mr. Jones, besides bedding Mrs. Jones, could have fun with the android nanny and maid. For Mrs. Jones’s part, she could share her bed with the android butler and gardener. A menage a six!
What’s really compelling about sex androids is that they’d be completely compliant with human wishes, and could be ordered according to any specifications. I’d like a Christina Hendricks look-alike who plays chess like a demon and darts sly glances across the board. Needless to say, no worries about a messy divorce, community property, or alimony. If Christina and I didn’t hit it off, I could send her back to the lab for reprogramming, trade her in on another model, sell her on eBay, whatever. The option of an attractive, no-risk companion would certainly be popular and, as a bonus, its popularity would probably cause the growth of the world’s population to come to an abrupt halt.
What if Christina and I are superbly compatible? Would I come to “love” her? Love has always been a slippery concept, and it will become even more slippery in the future. Surely I would love her as much as one loves a sports car or a computer with a sleek, intuitive interface. Very likely I’d love her as much as a cherished pet. It’s hard to conjecture beyond that. Our progeny will know when she and her like come along.
Of course, at the same time the Christinas and Gigolo Joes are being perfected, the first transhumans will appear. They’ll be genetically superior and equipped with cybernetic upgrades. One of these will be telepathy and brain-computer interfacing. So a kind of mind-meld between humans and androids will be possible. I can’t begin to imagine what the orgasms of the future will be like. Nor can I say with any confidence what civilization will be like when transhumans and androids intersect. To try would be nothing but rank speculation.
The Scratching Post 