Science fiction loves a dystopia. Our literary visions of the future give us a chance to explore the worries and fears we have about today’s society and the changes we are powerless to halt. We can’t guarantee what will happen and so, in the face of this loss of control, we create new worlds as warnings. From some of the earliest surviving stories in history through to the latest Hollywood blockbusters, we are shown examples of the terrible horrors that can occur when we play gods and build humans. But, actually, it just might be okay.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is big news at the moment. We see the results of AI research all around us - or rather, we don’t see them, because more often than not they blend seamlessly into our lives. The customer help on that e-commerce website you used earlier? More likely than not, it was a chatbot: automated AI. Those advertisements on social media that seem to read your thoughts? Machine learning algorithms, trawling vast sets of data to tailor sales to your online history or your status updates.

When we think about AI, we often think about the embodied version that stalks those stories: the robot. We already have robots, because a robot is merely a machine that can automate certain actions. They are all around us - cleaning our carpets, assembling cars in factories, performing keyhole surgery, providing care and comfort in nursing homes and dismantling bombs on the battlefield (or, worse, bearing bombs in the form of pilotless drones). So far, the robots that surround us are programmed by us. We tell them what to do and they obey. Sometimes they are instructed to train themselves on really large datasets to respond in new ways that aren't explicitly programmed, where they can invent new or better ways of doing things. However, we don't yet have robots that are sentient or conscious. We don’t have robots that can pass as human. Those are still in the realm of sci-fi.

Of all these, the sex robot is the attention-grabber. The tabloids love the topic (“Robot Phwoars” was a memorable headline), combining as it does the excitement of the risqué (“Talking Sex Robots With Warm Genitals Will Be on Sale Next Year!”) and the terror of technology (“Sex Robots Might Kill Off The Human Race, Expert Warns”). The recent Love and Sex with Robots conference held at Goldsmiths generated much of this coverage, but beyond the headlines were some far more promising insights.

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"Why should a sex robot even look human?"
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David Levy, who in 2007 published the book after which the conference was named, has a much more utopian view of sex robots. As he sees it: “Almost everyone wants someone to love, but many people have no one. If this natural human desire can be satisfied for everyone who is capable of loving, surely the world would be a much happier place.” His overall outlook is delightfully promising (barring some caveats), with the optimism that we can literally engineer happiness.