The Economics of Sex Robots

>And once they look away, they'll find that they have nothing; they've poured their efforts into something that has left them with no real status in society.

>Similarly, people using robotic devices in this way will have poured something rather different into them but the result is still the same;

I agree that a stable family is the ideal but I fail to see how spending your money on sex dolls is worse than getting divorced in your late 20s or early 30s and getting stuck paying for kids for a decade or more. Those people manage just fine.

Would you expect someone who spent 15 years doing $12/hour factory work and video games, then switching to programming to make $50/hour, to be amazed at how much better it is to have real status in society? For me, video games will always be better. Expensive cars and big houses have nothing to offer me, or I would have tried to be competitive from the start. I have easier access to women, but don't know what to do with it. But in general, society treats most people with respect and really doesn't have that much it can give you as a reward. Almost nothing compared to a video game. It's real life that's filled with tradeoffs, poorly gamified, and empty.

Billions of people are also addicted to virtual social media likes. Our brains are very adaptable to find reward and meaning in anything

Maybe we should be investigating the cause of unfilled biological needs instead? I do not want to open a whole can of worms, but do you think the ease of online dating and the meat market of tinder/bumble/instagram/whatever has any effect on this?

What makes you believe that people are getting married exclusively for the purpose of elevating their social status?

Similarly, people who get married and have children can one day look away and realize they have none of the status markers of society accorded a long-term committed couple / family.

I'd say that is only sexism if you consider it biologically wrong. If you believe that it's a correct description of an effect caused by genetics, then it would be descriptive instead.

But what your comment nicely illustrates is that whether someone considers something sexist depends on whether or not they believe it to be true. As a result, people who are unwilling to accept certain objective truths might consider descriptive science to be sexist.

If I say "women are biologically different which causes them to have different skills", that can be argued both ways. Some people might focus on lactation and agree. Others might think about mental skills and strongly disagree.

> I'm sorry, but how is this writing not blatantly sexist?

It is! It just happens to be sexist towards acceptable targets. Since men are perceived as dominant and powerful, the sexism is regarded as a non-issue.

I think you can read it much more charitably.

Rather than assuming it implies "men are dumb, like dogs" or "men are like dogs, and dumb", you could instead read it as "men can get aroused so easily. Human arousal is dumb".

I take no offense at the idea that the monkey-brain arousal mechanisms of men and women is "dumb", in the sense of simplistic. Logically, we know a picture is not a valid mating target, but still we can get aroused.

Yes, if you read it as calling men dumb, it's a little sexist. But if you read it as a commentary on human arousal, well, that's not a thinking feeling target, so you can be no more sexist against it than against a rock.

At the very end it seems to me she is trying to side with men in some capacity, but without agitating women.

>But market innovation has already created something dreadful on the other side of the coin: a large segment of men that have no prospect of satisfying their most basic desires.

Though this comes at the end, and without much else said about it.

I can’t speak for the females, but it’s absolutely true. Sex is, well, sexist.

i genuinely don't understand what is offensive about the line you quoted

I am a human male and I found that part to be both humorous and insightful.

Not really seeing sexism, I’m more annoyed that it ignores everyone besides heterosexual men.

"Humans can become aroused looking at flat images of other humans in black and white” is probably a better way to put it.

It's also a bad analogy: a dog reacting aggressively to their own image vs a human getting aroused by images of someone else. It's apples and oranges folks! I came up with two much better analogies

1. Ever think a dog is dumb for humping a stuffed animal? Human men can become aroused looking at flat images of nude women in black and white. <- Comparing dog vs. human arousal to external stimulus

2. Ever think a dog is dumb for growling at his reflection in the mirror? Human men can become aroused by looking at themselves in the mirror. <- Comparing dog vs (unusual) human reaction to seeing their own reflection.

One could make the same case for prostitution.

It is legalized or decriminalized in many countries (Australia, Netherlands, Germany...), so sex is widely available to those who need it and the price is not particularly high either. Especially in comparison to current sex doll prices.

So my guess is that this article is unnecessary alarmist and reductionist and that its predictions are unlikely to become true because what men want out of a relationship or even just a sexual encounter is more than just a quick discharge.

> Second, even those who master those "subtle social cues" (which have the important feature of plausible deniability)

For people who pick up on these cues the point isn't plausible deniability but quick, effortless communication. If you demonstrate you can't pick up on the cues you are a less desirable match -- not undesirable but less desirable -- because people around you will have to put a lot more effort into communicating with you than they do with other people and there will be more instances of miscommunication. This is unpleasant. It's not fair that people with a communicative handicap should be found less desirable but them's the breaks. It isn't fair if you're born poor or graceless or self-centered or too fat or too thin or with ugly features or bad skin or a gut that produces too much gas or with an inclination to be cruel and so on ad infinitum. The people judging you know it isn't fair, but they also know there are other choices. Also, there are plenty of unfortunate women willing to give the unfortunate men a chance to show their good qualities.

Have you ever smelled a goat?

There is in Japan based on surveys of men there.

> Anyway, in my opinion, what people do to themselves or other unforced, uncompelled, consenting, sentient and intelligent creatures without creating immediate dangers for non-participants shouldn't be anybody's business.

To argue the other side of that, there are some behaviors that are destructive to society as a whole. Everyone can easily picture why drug abuse or alcohol abuse is bad for society. There are subtler things too though. For example divorce is bad for society because single parenthood is hard and those children grow up with a disadvantage. That doesn't mean the state has the right to interfere, but it might mean having more requirements for marriage or a public contraceptive policy is a good idea.

In this particular case these (presumably men) would be out of the dating pool and would be less likely to have children. I don't see an awful lot wrong with that. They're mostly the low status men that were functionally out of the dating pool anyway.

Or maybe the sex robots are so good, people stop marrying and having children to such an extent that the population collapses, the economy shrinks, and human population drops until it reaches some new, lower equilibrium. Given how we destroy our planet, it's hard to get upset at that outcome.

More likely some cultures would do that, and others (e.g. Mormons?) Don't and then the breeding culture eventually replaces the non breeding culture. Unless you're part of that group, it doesn't seem like an improvement. But it is very much the way of nature. Which we're still a part of no matter how smart we think we are.

Surely the percentage is going to depend on what's available and how much it costs. Currently, only the desperate will spend $6000 on an unresponsive chunk of silicone, but the calculus might change if there's a perfect facsimile of a porn star matching every preference and fetish available to rent for $20.

Humans are the environment. The environment is not good or bad, but indifferent to the existence or nonexistence of itself or humans.

> losing half of his fortune in the case of a failed marriage

Marriage isn't a necessity for this to happen. In some jurisdictions (e.g. Canada) you even don't have to have been married to pay alimony in the case of a split.

Although no kids were involved in my case, "mere" alimony can be crushing. I spent a several years living on $625/mo (the residue after alimony and payroll taxes). And no, I wasn't particularly well off to begin with, left with maybe $500K net worth after the split.

So, beware. On the other hand, being poor-ish makes you realize that possession don't matter so much after all. And drinking will pave over a lot of unhappiness.

As for sex toys and porn, there's a lot to be said for them. We might actually be far happier if we reserved man/woman sex just for reproduction. And even then, maybe artificial insemination would be the way to go.

One of the best things about the Internet is that one can read literally thousands of tales of relationship woe if one cares to. If that had been available way back when, it would have saved me a lot of grief.

so it's unwise to have kids at least financially.

unless you're not able to afford it, in this case the government will step in with food stamps free lunch etc. the public raise your kids instead.

the system punishes those who work hard and follow rules, and awards those who breaks them, it's called equity, social justice, etc.

A tax could help. I think that approach showed some effectiveness in reducing Mexicans' consumption of soft drinks. I think good nutrition and nutrition education in schools would be a more durable and effective approach, though. A lot of families just don't have the knowledge and habits to prepare and consume healthy meals. The sugary foods are popular because they are cheap, tasty, and effortless; making food that's healthy but still tastes good requires more work.

I'm not sure I follow, especially the focus on overweight women not marrying up. The article has a more egalitarian slant to it than that.

These things can be true, but what is their relation to a disrupted dating market?

I get what you're driving at, and I agree somewhat, but I think most of the men I know struggled at least at some point with understanding those rules. A lot of us can probably recall some embarrassing missteps in our teens/twenties while we figured these things out; I certainly can. Once you figure out the rules you might not be part of that group for much longer.