Re: Sexbots

Anders Sandberg (asa@nada.kth.se)
11 Mar 1999 17:02:38 +0100

The problem with this scenario seems to be that it assumes sexbots to be relatively cheap. But when you start to think about the actual implementation (warm, moist synthetic skin, dextrous limbs, fairly complex behaviors, ability to act autonomously for extended periods of time) it becomes clear that they will be highly complex machines that will be extremely expensive at first. Exactly how they will be used will depend on how quickly the price falls and their initial uses; if the image becomes that they belong to cybernetic houses of ill repute the home models might become less likely, keeping the price up. It is also unclear how much people would want to pay for a sexbot.

It would be a reasonable to combine the sexbot with other uses, such as domestic help (the french maid or latino gardener? :-) which would make it more cost effective. But if people have hang-ups on displaying their sexbots (as seem likely given current morals) then there would be a incentive to make ones domestic bot look as non-sexy as possible
(would keep down the price, but the same problems with high initial
costs would affect the domestic bots as the sexbots; multipurpose bots are likely more cost efficient).

My guess is that it will take a while after we get domestic robots before we get sexbots, and exactly how they will look and be used will likely be quite path dependent. One could imagine hiding sexbots in closets, or even having transformer domestic bots (lots of possibilities for a transhuman sitcom :-)

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Anders Sandberg                                      Towards Ascension!
asa@nada.kth.se                            http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/
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