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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
In recent years, sex dolls have become increasing sophisticated and realistic in their resemblance to human beings, including mechanized components, and are thus now referred to as humanoid sex robots. Some media outlets have gone as far as to suggest that sex robots and other social robots will eventually become almost indistinguishable from humans.
This has sparked a number of interesting ethical and philosophical debates related to the significance of these robots and the possibility that future machines will replicate the physical intimacy between two people. In a recent study featured in Springer's International Journal of Social Robotics, two researchers at the University of Virginia and the University of Bergamo in Italy have taken a closer look at some of the current arguments and predictions about sex robots, carrying out an ethics-based and critical discourse analysis.
"We started our joint research to debunk some myths and misunderstandings in the media regarding the future of artificial intelligence," Deborah Johnson and Mario Verdicchio, the two researchers who carried out the study, told TechXplore. "We were struck by how fundamentally flawed some of the ideas were and especially the assumption that the computational version of some aspects of reality are the same as the real thing."
In their paper, Johnson and Verdicchio essentially challenge the perception of humanoid sex robots as robotic substitutes of lovers and companions. They argue that although humanoid robots may look and act more and more like human beings in the future, the claim that they will eventually replace humans is far-fetched and far from a certainty.
"Our research is aimed at showing that humanoid sex robots could come to be understood in ways that keep their status as machines, albeit technologically very sophisticated machines." Johnson and Verdicchio said.
Deborah G. Johnson et al. Constructing the Meaning of Humanoid Sex Robots, International Journal of Social Robotics (2019). DOI: 10.1007/s12369-019-00586-z
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 29 2019, @06:54PM (2 children)
Can I claim these as dependents on my tax return?
Asking for a friend of course.
#RobotLivesMatter
(Score: 2) by stretch611 on Sunday September 29 2019, @08:33PM
No, but you might be able to use them to get into the car pool lane.
* - Not legally, and pretty easy to figure out if you are pulled over, but it probably will fool all the cameras while traveling at 60+ mph.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Monday September 30 2019, @04:34PM
I bet you can write them off as a business expense; or perhaps a depreciable asset over the course of a few years.
The tax overhaul in the US will let you to deduct much of the expense the first year you put your 'administrative assistant' to good use in your practice!
Really, trying to get them to be dependents will be questionable. Getting them to be assets to be exploited and eventually used up and discarded in favor of a better model is far easier! The strategy is the same when interfacing with such object oriented domains within other discplines, too, so keep your receipts!