The Ethics of the Artificial Lover

2020 ◽  
pp. 271-290
Author(s):  
Kate Devlin
Keyword(s):  
Ethical Concerns ◽  
Commercial Viability ◽  
Sex Robots ◽  
Single Form

This chapter discusses ethical concerns associated with sex robots, which are now becoming a reality and a commercial viability. It argues that we have the chance to shape and explore this technology, to make it more equal and diverse. Many of the sex robots being developed today have a very specific female-gendered embodiment, which runs the risk of objectifying women. To address this concern, the chapter proposes that we move away from human-like, human-size dolls toward sex robots that take nonhuman forms. Not being tied to one single form provides an opportunity to think ethically about the development of sex technology.

Constructions of Moral Values in Reader Comments of the Samantha Sex Robot Discourse in East African Newspapers

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 382-403
Author(s):  
Joseph Njuguna
Keyword(s):  
Moral Values ◽  
Sexual Relationships ◽  
East African ◽  
Majority Opinion ◽  
Ethical Concerns ◽  
Sex Robots ◽  
Ethical Evaluations ◽  
Reader Comments ◽  
Domestic Instability ◽  
Wrath Of God

Abstract Although artificial intelligence (ai) has been touted as revolutionary, this technology has sparked ethical concerns, with man accused of attempting to create a ‘play God’ with it. While creators of sex robots have been hailed for reigniting sexual relationships, they have received flack in equal measure for their apparent moral absurdity. From a Christian values perspective, this study interrogates how the Samantha sex robot invention was framed in 129 online reader comments in two East African newspapers – The Standard and The Daily Monitor. Findings showed that comments fell under the value themes of ‘family bond’, ‘compromised conscience’, and ‘apocalypse’. While a few positioned sex robots as a panacea to domestic instability, the majority opinion viewed the robots as ‘destroyers’ of the God-ordained family unit and tools of dehumanizing women, and thus morally contradictory to Christian teachings. Justifying sex robots was considered to be ‘negotiating’ or ‘rationalizing’ with established Christian values and therefore ‘rebelling against God’. Man’s extremity with the creation and use of sex robots sparked predictions of a self-fulfilling prophecy of his extermination for inciting the wrath of God. The preservation of culture also underpinned the ethical evaluations of robots by some commenters.

scholarly journals It Loves Me, It Loves Me Not

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 402-424 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sven Nyholm ◽  
Lily Eva Frank ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Emotional Responses ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Ethical Concerns ◽  
Emotional Bonds ◽  
Sex Robots ◽  
Emotional Vulnerability ◽  
Human Tendency ◽  
Meaningful Relationships ◽  
Do So

Drawing on insights from robotics, psychology, and human-computer interaction, developers of sex robots are currently aiming to create emotional bonds of attachment and even love between human users and their products. This is done by creating robots that can exhibit a range of facial expressions, that are made with human-like artificial skin, and that possess a rich vocabulary with many conversational possibilities. In light of the human tendency to anthropomorphize artefacts, we can expect that designers will have some success and that this will lead to the attribution of mental states to the robot that the robot does not actually have, as well as the inducement of significant emotional responses in the user. This raises the question of whether it might be ethically problematic to try to develop robots that appear to love their users. We discuss three possible ethical concerns about this aim: first, that designers may be taking advantage of users’ emotional vulnerability; second, that users may be deceived; and, third, that relationships with robots may block off the possibility of more meaningful relationships with other humans. We argue that developers should attend to the ethical constraints suggested by these concerns in their development of increasingly humanoid sex robots. We discuss two different ways in which they might do so.

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