From: Anders Sandberg (asa@nada.kth.se)
Date: Thu Mar 11 1999 - 09:02:38 MST
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 :-)
-- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Anders Sandberg Towards Ascension! asa@nada.kth.se http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/ GCS/M/S/O d++ -p+ c++++ !l u+ e++ m++ s+/+ n--- h+/* f+ g+ w++ t+ r+ !y
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