Author of the week

last updated 8 January 2015

David Levy has never had sex with a robot, said Sharon Gaudin in PC World. But the possibility, he predicts, is just around the corner. By midcentury, Levy says, humans will be legally marrying robots in some states. In his bluntly titled new book, Love and Sex With Robots, the 62-year-old artificial-intelligence researcher gives no indication that he’s joking. Some humans, he points out, already treat animals as if they’re family members and form emotional attachments even with mechanical pets. Robots, meanwhile, are continuing to increase their capacity to empathize, converse, and win the human heart. “By midcentury,” he says, “I don’t think the difference between robots and humans will be any more than the difference between people who live in Maine and people who live in the bayou of Louisiana.”

Levy admits that even his wife still thinks that the idea of sex with a robot is “extremely weird,” said Siri Agrell in the Toronto Globe and Mail. He expects, however, that women will prove as enthusiastic about robot sex as men, and that this new sexual revolution will bringing sweeping benefits. Think less prostitution, he says, fewer lonely people, and far more knowledgeable sex partners. As for himself, Levy can imagine giving a sex robot a whirl but not becoming an owner. “I’m happily married and don’t feel the need for one.” Not that he would be troubled if his wife took in a robot lover of her own. “No, no,” he says. “Why not?”