Three months ago we featured an article where Matt McMullen decided to make sex toys that can follow commands and verbally respond to the user. Well, most men love the robots since they don’t have to invest a lot of their time trying to seduce the thing or take it on a date. However, Dr Richardson, a robot ethicist at De Montfort University in Leicester, wants to raise awareness of the issue and encourage people not to use the machines.
“Sex robots seem to be a growing focus in the robotics industry and the models that they draw on – how they will look, what roles they would play – are very disturbing indeed,” she told BBC.
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“We think that the creation of such robots will contribute to detrimental relationships between men and women, adults and children, men and men and women and women,” she added.
Currently a number of companies like Abyss creations have increased their production by developing both male and female electronics. True Companion are building the world’s first sex robot which will be released very soon.
“We are not supplanting the wife or trying to replace a girlfriend. This is a solution for people who are between relationships or someone who has lost a spouse.
“People can find happiness and fulfillment other than via human interaction,” he added.
He hopes Roxxxy will eventually become a self-learning engine that is able to talk to her owner and learn his likes or dislikes.
The sex toys will have the ability to communicate with the user and learn how to hate and love. “The physical act of sex will only be a small part of the time you spend with a sex robot – the majority of time will be spent socializing and interacting,” he said.
Unfortunately, the machines are very expensive. A single doll will cost you about Sh700,000. So will you buy a car or a sex doll?
Dr Kevin Curran, a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers claims that the products are going to dominate the market.
“We would be naive to ignore market forces for ‘intimate robots’. Building human-like robots is quite easy once the mechanics are taken care of,” Kevin Curran said.
“Turning these robots into attractive companions is simply adding a ‘skin’. Not difficult at all and not done much to date as most robots are built in research-led institutions not businesses. That time is coming to an end,” he said.
People around the globe will have different opinions about the innovations, and activists will come up with campaigns to kill the projects. “There have been campaign groups actively voicing opposition to killer robots but I foresee the time soon when humans are lobbying against robot companions or at least shouting ‘not in my backyard’,” he said.
David Levy the author of the book Love and Sex with Robots claims that by 2050 human and robot relationships will be more intimate. “There is an increasing number of people who find it difficult to form relationships and this will fill a void. It is not demeaning to women any more than vibrators are demeaning,” he said.
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