Intimate relationships, such as love and sex, between human and machines, especially robots, has been one of the themes of science fiction. However, this topic has never been treated in the academic area until recently. It was first raised and discussed by David Levy in his book Love and Sex with Robotics (2007). Since then, researchers have come up with many implementations of robot companions, like sex robots, emotional robots, humanoid robots, and artificial intelligent systems that can simulate human emotions. This chapter presents a summary of significant recent activity in this field, predicts how the field is likely to develop, and discusses ethical and legal issues. We also discuss our research in physical devices for human–robot love and sex communication.
