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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: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 30 2019, @07:53PM
I won't make that argument.
Rather, I'll just point out that for me, sharing a sexual experience with someone means more than just me having an orgasm.
Before I even *want* to be physically intimate with someone, I have to like and be attracted to them *and* have those feelings be reciprocated.
When that bar is met, we can enjoy each other and gain more pleasure from the activity for both of us. That's pretty satisfying IMHO.
If you just want to get off, or are focused solely on your own pleasure, then that sexual activity (even if it's with another actual human) is inherently masturbatory.
I figure that I can do that all by myself, without any help from anyone else.
That's not to say that I need to be in a relationship with someone to have non-masturbatory sex.
Do what you think is best for you. But be aware that others (even men like myself) have other ideas about such things.
When I was younger and traveled a lot, I did patronize prostitutes a bunch of times. And I always found the experience to be much less satisfying than with someone who wanted to be with me because of who I am, not because I paid them.
As such, I stopped doing so and find that my non-solo sexual activities are much more satisfying and gratifying.