Sex with robots is unethical, researcher claims

[Doc Savage Fan]

Two movies come to mind "AI" and "Cherry 2000" more relevant then "Firefly" in the sexbot area.

Or perhaps...Stepford Wives.

 

[C1]

Two movies come to mind "AI" and "Cherry 2000".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6KJtFZoflc

 

[davmat787]

What if the robot had consciousness, free will, and felt love?

Then it wouldn't be a robot, and could grant consent, or not.



The more interesting issue to me is the inevitable merging of technology and our species. We've seen just the very beginning with pacemakers, biomechanical prosthetics, and deep brain stimulation.



Follow that progression another hundred, thousand, or ten thousand years.

 

[TheELF]

Is there not?

Define the point where something gets free will for me then. And how do we test that.

Same for consciousness and love (good luck with that one!)

Can you stick a device to some access point and read out it's next action? = no free will.
Same for the other stuff, if it's code and you can see what trigers what by reading that code than it's not real.

 

[Jeff7]

The current high water mark for stupid, embarrassing ways to die is autoerotic asphyxiation (other than being hit by a train, which is even dumber). Imagine the new possibilities opened up with the addition of robots.

Hook it up with a blood-oxygen monitor, and you could be choked to 0.0025" of death with 3σ repeatability.

Then it wouldn't be a robot, and could grant consent, or not.


The more interesting issue to me is the inevitable merging of technology and our species. We've seen just the very beginning with pacemakers, biomechanical prosthetics, and deep brain stimulation.


Follow that progression another hundred, thousand, or ten thousand years.

I always wanted the Borg story in Star Trek to show that humans created them by accident. Make little nanoprobes to perfect human DNA, and a few programming bugs showed up after they'd been on the market for awhile.

The human brain and body have definite flaws and limitations.
Options: A merging of the two, using the benefits of both, or an elimination of the organic portion when/if a better artificial method is devised.
Of course, there's nothing saying that all three couldn't exist at the same time: Pure organic, blend, and pure synthetic. The pure organic might be fearful of the newcomers, and react violently. Sharing the same region of land simply may not be feasible.

 

[shira]

I guess this researcher would also rule out total-immersion, virtual-reality sex, with full-body "stimulators", even though not a single robot was harmed in the making of the, er, video.

 

[MongGrel]

Two movies come to mind "AI" and "Cherry 2000" more relevant then "Firefly" in the sexbot area.

I'm in for a sexbot, that can be programmed to cook at a Michelin level and clean too.

()

 

[WelshBloke]

Can you stick a device to some access point and read out it's next action? = no free will.

Does a die have free will when you roll it?

Same for the other stuff, if it's code and you can see what trigers what by reading that code than it's not real.

Even we run code.

 

[Spungo]

I expect people having their needs fulfilled are LESS likely to abuse women.

Madness! Next you'll be telling us that putting a bunch of men together in prisons with no access to sex leads to an extremely high rate of prisoner rape. You, sir, are insane.

 

[Darwin333]

I see, sex robots will lessen the power between a woman's legs.

I think you hit the real concern on the head with that one.

 

[Darwin333]

I'm guessing she would be opposed to any "sex toy" that looked too realistic. Here's most of the rest of the article:

I find it ironic that she seems to think that these new sex toys will be almost exclusively used by men when right now the VAST majority of the sex toy market is women. It's just been relatively recently that men have had options anything close to what women have had.

Yet the rise of the vibrator or even the more advance "rabbit" hasn't resulted in half the women in the world no longer desiring sex with a real man.

 

[Moonbeam]

Can you stick a device to some access point and read out it's next action? = no free will.
Same for the other stuff, if it's code and you can see what trigers what by reading that code than it's not real.

You realize, I hope, that you are a machine made of atoms, like any other robot. A woma is also a machine.

There are at least two issues here. One is how we experience machines, how we internally define them, our unconscious attitudes toward them, eat. Serial killers, it appears from psychological profiles of them, do not experience any sense that people are alive, that they are only things like we normally experience machines. Children, however, can experience dolls and action figures as if they were alive. The ethical question, from this, I think, is which experience has the greatest emotional pay off. Which brings joy to life. I will take the child over the serial killer every time.

Secondly, what are the mechanisms by which we impute value to things. I believe we do so when we see ourselves in the other. Sex with love between two conscious beings is to be preferred to sex with machines.

I find that if I espouse a value system where one thing brings greater emotional reward than another, I will inevitably be attacked for being a prude. I don't really care if somebody loves their toaster. I know without any doubt or reservation whatsoever, that sex with the beloved, another person who reciprocates, is better. I will always posh for peek experience rather than simple sexual reliease.

 

[Darwin333]

A very good question.

We'd first need to be able to determine that a robot had one or more of those characteristics. And if that were possible, and robots did indeed possess at least one of these, then we shouldn't be allowed to "exploit" them for ANY purpose. For example, if a computer had consciousness, how could we justify "owning" that computer? How could we justify using it essentially as a slave, whether for sex or any other service?

The question comes down to what level of "consciousness" are we talking about? By most definitions of the word dolphins are conscious yet we exploit them at our leisure to this day.

 

[Moonbeam]

How so? Elaborate.

We do not have healthy loving relationships because of self hate. We have contempt for anybody stupid enough to love us and drive them away by testing their love till it breaks. We hate ourselves, not because we are actually worthless but because we were made to feel that way. In that way we are mentally ill.

Self hate creates deep unconscious needs that we find substitute satisfactions for when we reject the real thing.

 

[Moonbeam]

The question comes down to what level of "consciousness" are we talking about? By most definitions of the word dolphins are conscious yet we exploit them at our leisure to this day.

I have seen divers cutting nets off entangled whales. We are not all at equally I evolved.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Replace women with a robot who does not bring up stuff you did a decade ago?

Sounds good to me.

A robot who does not complain, grip, get moody, get fat, or spend money. Where do I buy one?

It had better penetrate, then. :hmm:

 

[Darwin333]

I expect people having their needs fulfilled are LESS likely to abuse women.

That's a good point. Pedophiles are considered incurably sick and from what I understand there is a substantial amount of evidence backing that up. If a robotic sex toy could satisfy their urges then isn't that a good thing? As far as making men "want" to abuse women more, anyone seen porn lately? How many men here treat their wives the same way men treat the women in the porn (and I am talking your average porn not the extreme stuff) they watch?

 

[Darwin333]

I guess this researcher would also rule out total-immersion, virtual-reality sex, with full-body "stimulators", even though not a single robot was harmed in the making of the, er, video.

Heck we are already half way there. I can imagine this http://www.realtouch.com/

In a smashup with something like okulus rift really soon.

 

[Darwin333]

Follow that progression another hundred, thousand, or ten thousand years.

We simply can't perceive that far into the future. How crazy would a person in 1915 considered to be if they were talking about things that we take for granted today like smartphones. Hell my phone is more powerful than a quarter of the computers I have built for myself in my lifetime. When I was building my new PC a decade or so ago and someone came along and said that I'd have something more (or equally) powerful that fit in my pocket and went everywhere I did I would have called bullshit.

 

[1prophet]

We simply can't perceive that far into the future. How crazy would a person in 1915 considered to be if they were talking about things that we take for granted today like smartphones. Hell my phone is more powerful than a quarter of the computers I have built for myself in my lifetime. When I was building my new PC a decade or so ago and someone came along and said that I'd have something more (or equally) powerful that fit in my pocket and went everywhere I did I would have called bullshit.

Oh we can definitely perceive, it's our realities that fall far short because of selfishness and greed (short term profit only matters mentality).

Futurama 1939 New York World's Fair "To New Horizons" 1940 General Motors 23min

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cRoaPLvQx0

 

[Fayd]

what kind of "research" enables one to claim that sex with hypothetical robots is unethical?

 

[Mike64]

Richardson — with Erik Billing of the University of Skövde in Sweden, the co-creator of the Campaign Against Sex Robots — said that she is not anti-sex

They may not (or may) be anti-sex, but they are clearly insane. Not to mention inane. If this is the most worthy social cause they can think of to champion, someone should find them socially useful work like sweeping sidewalks somewhere...

If sentient artificial intelligence/robots existed, I'd agree with them, though on different grounds. But as it stands, we're talking about (somewhat more complex than usual) mechanical sex toys. Are they opposed to vibrating dildos, too? :hmm:

 

[Mike64]

what kind of "research" enables one to claim that sex with hypothetical robots is unethical?

And - I ask purely out of intellectual curiosity of course - where does one volunteer for such studies?:whiste:

 

[shira]

They may not (or may) be anti-sex, but they are clearly insane. Not to mention inane. If this is the most worthy social cause they can think of to champion, someone should find them socially useful work like sweeping sidewalks somewhere...

If sentient artificial intelligence/robots existed, I'd agree with them, though on different grounds. But as it stands, we're talking about (somewhat more complex than usual) mechanical sex toys. Are they opposed to vibrating dildos, too? :hmm:

These researchers are actually guilty of mixing their messages. On the one hand, when (not if) sentient computer systems are created, I agree with them that there will be significant ethical considerations that will need to be worked out.

But the other theory being proposed is that if sex robots become too realistic, that will cause increased objectification of real women (or maybe both sexes). But I can argue the opposite point: When men can use easily use sex robots to fully satisfy their sexual desires, real women will become LESS objectified, as they will be less associated with sexual gratification.

 

[DucatiMonster696]

I don't think that anything is tied down as hard and fast when it comes to determining whether a robot has consciousness. Though the hurdle for consent for consent or ownership may not have to be that high.

An analogy for ownership is akin to that of pets. In the case of pets, some of the more militant PETA members would argue that no human has the right to own an animal. Is it surprising that some Feminist would argue for a prohibition of humans, especially males, having sex with robots? This is link is quite old, so you need not point this out.

http://www.dogforums.com/general-dog-forum/17919-peta-pet-slavery.html

The official current views of PETA are here. But they avoid the term ownership, at least on the first page.



http://www.peta.org/about-peta/why-peta/pets/

I could maybe see how you could apply the term "Pet keeping" to cats since they can often be very aloof and independent but most breeds of dogs would absolutely not survive without humans.

In fact dogs are one of the few species of animals that benefit more from their relationship with humans than humans benefit from their relationship with them.

If you think about everything a pet dog receives in exchange for their companionship (food, shelter, safety, medical care, etc) they greater share of benefits from being owned by humans (decent ones at least).

However you could probably point out how working dogs maybe put out enough benefits toward humans to level that playing field but outside of work dogs most dogs kept as pets have it pretty damn easy.