Robots and Romance

HBO showed “Bicentennial Man” this afternoon and I was just so taken away with the robot Andrew’s poetic description of sex…

“…that u can lose yourself… everything… all boundaries… all time… that two bodies can become so mixed up, that u don’t know who’s who or what’s what… and just when the sweet confusion is so intense you think you’re gonna die… you kind of do; leaving you alone in your separate body, but the one you love is still there – that’s a miracle. You can go to heaven and come back alive. You can go back anytime you want with the one you love…”

If only real men (as in humans) were that receptive to the romance of making love, huh? Hehehe.

The movie, based on the short story of one of my favorite writers Isaac Asimov, reminded me of a news article on the internet a couple of years ago about human-robot marriages becoming possible and even “legal” in the year 2050 -- a forecast by David Levy in his book "Love + Sex With_Robots". Certainly that’s a very interesting topic to discuss and debate on… ethical issues… emotional limitations… Is this the new social evolution?

Lately, Japan (particularly this inventor Hiroshi Ishiguru of Osaka University) has been coming up with humanoid prototypes and they freak me out. All throughout our history, romantic defiance has been about RACE (he’s black and she’s white)… RELIGION (he’s a Muslim and she’s Catholic)… SOCIAL CLASS (he’s a Montague and she’s a Capulet, hehe)… and now we’re facing GENDER issues (he’s Adam and he’s Steve)… and if futurists are right about their approximations, we’ll have the “He’s human and she’s a robot” love drama. Can LOVE exist between a soul and a software?

Anyway, the idea of humans and robots “getting it on” just freaks me out. It’s probably because this iconic scene from the cult B movie “Cherry 2000” was solidly imprinted in my nine-year-old mind when I saw this on Betamax in 1987. This was funny and freaky at the same time. But it definitely sends the message that making love to a robot can be a FATAL ATTRACTION!