So last night I was skimming through the official Church of Satan Info Pack, like you do, and I made an interesting discovery. Alongside such standard Satany things as, you know, eugenics, vengeance, naked-lady altars, it turns out that the official Church of Satan position on sex robots is: Yes, please!
In fact, they’re so into it that it’s point number four in their “five point plan to move society in directions that are considered to be beneficial to Satanists.”
Here’s their pitch:
Satanists advocate a new industry, the development and promotion of artificial human companions. These humanoids will be constructed to be as realistic as possible, and available to anyone who can afford one.
So poor people will have to make do with blow-up dolls, I guess.
Recognizing that the human animal often raises himself up through the denegration of another, this would provide a safe outlet for such behavior. Have the lover of your dreams, regardless of your own prowess; every man a king who can purchase his own subject; or contrarywise, buy the master you wish to serve.
That got a little bit dark, huh? Then again, this is the Church of, you know, SATAN.
Freedom of choice to satisfy your most secret desires with no-one to be bothered is now at hand. What could be better for blowing-off the tension that exists throughout our society, and promoting healthier interaction among true humans?
I can’t say I’m 100% with the Church of Satan on every issue, or even 1%, but I’m going to support them on this: Sex robots for Satanists — or anyone else who feels the need to “raise … himself up through the denegration of another.” Because it’s better to be horrible to inanimate objects than to human beings.
Sorry, numerous *studies*. Sutocorrect on phone, ug.
@thewebbard
You’re not wrong, but it’s this weird mixture of people who want to protest religion, people who just want to embrace a parody religion as a full religion, and people who just are trolls.
That mixture, as you might guess, leads to obnoxious assholes and stupid opinions, in a variety of flavors.
Pretty sure Ive seen at least one study suggesting that “taking out” negativity (ie anger) might not actually help reduce it but may rather stoke it… altho I think theres room for more research…
…but what happens when the robots are so sophisticatedly developed that they gain sentience – perhaps life?
I think the biggest ethical dilemma re: robots as specific outlets is whether or not its ethical to create a being with a complex enough sentience that it can act in a realistically human manner to a situation, but also give it specific and unalterable desires. I.e. to impose upon its self-determination.
For instance, a human having sex with a humanoid robot should be in itself fine, so long as they both consent. But what if you create the robot such that it always consents for a certain person, no matter what? Is that consent still meaningful? Technically from the robot’s POV there would be nothing amiss because that’s just how they process the world; they don’t know anything else. But I’m undecided on if that’s all that counts in the matter.
Aside, if you know LaVey was a carny before he founded the Church, it explains a lot.
@dlouwe
“I think the biggest ethical dilemma re: robots as specific outlets is whether or not its ethical to create a being with a complex enough sentience that it can act in a realistically human manner to a situation, but also give it specific and unalterable desires. I.e. to impose upon its self-determination.”
I think the biggest ethical dilemma is simulated sexual abuse and reinforcing this as a behaviour instead of guiding people away from it.
An A.I. might to a human look like it’s doing things in a realistically human manner but it doesn’t yet mean sentience on the part of the machine.
@Leda Atomica
Fair, I more meant from the perspective of the robot. There’s a ton of considerations to be made from the human side before even getting to that point, absolutely.
Really? Do you have a study with causative and not correlative findings?
“@Ohlmann No sir. Numerous stifles have shown that consumption of pornography reduces sexual satisfaction and that *violent* porn leads to increased tendency toward violence directed at one’s partner and is specifically tied to interpreting views of women, women’s issues, and rape in a light manner.”
The way you say it, it’s about as stupid as saying “violent videogames/movies/books create mass murderers” to counter the fact that some people are naturally wrathful and like to escape in videogames, books, or movies. Even if it were true, it’s completely unrelated to the issue, because you seem to believe anything negative in somebody is clearly the product of his culture, which is wrong.
Some people have inherently problematics fetishes, and aren’t raving madmen who can’t control themselves. Let’s take someone who love to have pain in the bedroom. Thoses people would not turn to self harm if BDSM practices did not exist ; a good portion of them would just have a less good sexual life.
If a sexbot allow some people to have a safe and sound way to do what they desire, then it’s all good. But generalisations that sexbots would create more violent predators on the streets are ludicrous.
Also, sex-bots are extremely far away, and they will most probably be a slow expansion of the sex toy field more than of the porn. Projections on what it will authorize, and how it will interact with human psyche, is very wild guesses at best.
“I’m just speculating here, but are MRAs literally the Devil then?”
Christ, no…the Lordly Monarch of the North wouldn’t spit on ’em if they were on fire. For true.
I’m pretty sure sex robots, past just the Uncanny Valley thing (and the invariable “uncanny valley” jokes) will just end up being used to hold women to even more impossible standards.
I know that there’s something to be said for the diversion of people who will hurt people, but if a robot has any sentience whatsoever that will probably make it much easier for someone to make the jump to actual living, breathing human women.
Thus I just can’t with this one.
I’m pretty confident that sentience would be neither necessary nor desirable to these guys. I think they’d be happiest with a simple algorithm like the ones in dating sims.
The recent AMC/Channel 4 show Humans dealt with the issue of robots human enough to be used as sex partners, including “brothels” where clients could indeed carry out acts that would be illegal to do on humans. Unfortunately (SPOILER) some of the robots had achieved sentience/consciousness, and so pretty much felt what a human would feel.
I think before anyone even constructs a highly-intelligent robot, they should read up on some Issac Asimov and Micheal Foucault, as well as look at post-modernism’s greatest triumph: the furry fandom. I’d also recommend watching Blade Runner as well…
Depending on the level of intelligence and awareness a robot has, just what will happen if the robot begins to see and think more outside of what it was allowed to do? At some point, the robot becomes less of a robot and much closer to a human, and thus, it will have limits. I understand that it’s impossible for an AI to comprehend some things (why save the 1 brilliant writer as opposed to 5 flunkies because 5 is a bigger number than 1), but what isn’t to stop an AI from being tired and repressed of the same old routine?
Wasn’t the Channel 4 show called Humons? Or was that another show?
Off topic bad news.
Another mass shooting. This one in CA and it supposedly started at a center for people with developmental disabilities.
http://gawker.com/as-many-as-20-victims-reported-in-san-bernardino-mass-s-1745757446
The suspects are three white men in military gear so it’s fair to guess it’s more right wing terrorism.
I think that the title was styled as “HUM∀NS”, with an upside-down “A”, although the actual name is “Humans”.
WWTH
I heard about it just earlier and I’m glad the people in the comments are calling it as terrorism and realizing the double standards between white and people of color. But the ableism? Wow way to be respectful to disabled people everywhere including those who got shot /s
@WWTH
I just found out about this because my school is in that area. It’s the Art Institute of San Bernardino, and the school is lock-down to not allow anyone to enter or leave, since the gunmen haven’t been caught yet.
Just going to leave that there.
I happened to catch part of 1 episode of Humans, which seemed to be a human/robot mixed family having dinner. No impression of the show except that the robot actress was really good. She did an amazing job of being very, very close to human but still obviously not human. Really cool.
Sure, nothing elevates the human spirit like the ability to vent sadistic urges… (/s)
It’s obvious that those who get off on domination are never going to be satisfied with a robot.
Arthur,
I hope everyone you know is all right.
It’s fucking terrifying that they’re still at large. I really hope they’re done for the day.
There’s a live feed here. http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2015/dec/02/san-bernardino-shooting-live-coverage
The Guardian has gotten pretty good at doing live feeds of mass shootings 🙁