Disturbingly detailed dolls are being ordered into New Zealand
Childlike sex robots could help treat paedophiles and prevent them from offending with real children amid an "explosion" in use of the devices due in the next few years.
That's according to academics working on the "highly controversial" subject amid the unstoppable rise of the machines. Robotics philosopher Marc Behrendtof ULB University, Belgium, said what might seem "preposterous and despicable" at first glance could help protect children from sex predators.
Speaking in London at the International Congress on Love and Sex with Robots, he said he's "utterly convinced child sex bots (CSBs) are inevitable" with the Japanese Lala Doll already reportedly banned in places amid fears it is too childlike.
"We can either see them as crafty pieces of engineering made up of wires, sensors, motors and equipped with a rudimentary AI brain, or on the contrary we can choose to consider them as a symbolic presentation of a human being," he said.
"In practical terms, CSBs could be part of the solution in helping some very specific categories of paedophiles overcome or manage their morally reprehensible and illegal sexual offences."
The controversial question was one of many posed during the two-day event incongruously held in a secret location that turned out to be a Greek Orthodox Church in North London. Having been banned from Malaysia, dropped by another university and forced to move over terror fears, organisers Adrian Cheok and David Levy convened the group over plates of moussaka to talk about one of the creepiest or most exciting developments of the near future — depending on your point of view.
Childlike dolls are one step away from child sex bots. Experts claim they could be used to treat paedophiles. Photo / Supplied
Artificial Intelligence expert Mr Levy, author of Love And Sex With Robots, said there are two sides of the coin for paedophiles and it's impossible to tell which will prevail without further research, news.com.au reported.
"One possibility is that by creating child sex robots we'll be encouraging paedophiles and encouraging other people to become paedophiles. That's the argument that a lot of people find persuasive and therefore they believe that child sex robots should not be allowed," he said.
"The other side of the coin is that in the future there will be a lot of technology driven by AI that will be used to diagnose and treat people with psychological conditions.
"The very crude and blunt argument is simply this — if somebody is having sex with a child sex robot, they're not at the same time having sex with a child. That argument has also got some weight to it."
The early proponent in the field is convinced sex robots will soon become an integral part of our lives with plenty of unforeseen implications from sexual performance anxiety to legal stoushes over liability.
"The whole market will explode," he told news.com.au. "That will start next year with the Abyss Creations [Real Doll] product and then there'll be a lot of media publicity. There will be interviews with people who have used sex robots. There will be interviews with famous people like film stars and you can just imagine [a celebrity], gives an interview to a magazine saying, 'My goodness, I had the most fantastic sex this weekend with a robot made by XYZ company,' and suddenly XYZ company will have 20 million people queuing outside the door."
The former chess master is convinced publicity will overcome the ick-factor, only to be replaced by other worries like, "Do I measure up in the sack?"
"What will happen when, for example, a man is dating a woman and they decide to have sex for the first time and the woman tells the man she's had fantastic sex with this robot?" he asked.
"The man is immediately going to become anxious, he's going to get worried he's not going to be able to perform as well as the robot. The anxiety is going to affect his performance and that can immediately damage the relationship. That is a very serious potential problem and psychiatrists need to think a lot about how to deal with it and plan for it."
The Harmony Real Doll will come in different iterations with a customisable personality and measurements, as well as fantasy features like mermaid scales according to one expert. Photo / Supplied
The audience heard how people are already falling in love with digital mates in Japan through the Love Plus game where people can seduce, cuddle and buy presents for a digital girlfriend. Australian cognitive scientist Rebekah Rousi told of a future where robots would be able to lie and cheat, with humans struggling to keep up with their superior mates.
Others addressed the way synthetic voices created by tech giants like Amazon and IBM had features that could be manipulated to sound younger, softer with attributes like 'breathiness', 'whisper', 'apologetic' or 'good news'.
State University of New York's Julie Wosk said today's sex dolls "mirror the conception of a perfect woman" seen through television and films like Stepford Wives, Blade Runner 2049 and Bionic Woman.
Founder of the Campaign Against Sex Robots, Dr Kathleen Richardson, sees sex robots as a terrifying prospect for our future, grounded in the "master-slave" relationship in the same vein as porn and prostitution.
"If relationships aren't grounded on the idea of reciprocity then we've got serious problems," she said, adding that she gets emails from men who claim to buy sex dolls because they claim to "hate women" and be "bored of prostitutes".
"People have to make a choice whether they want to keep it going or do something about it. I want to do something about it."
