Tag Archives: futurism

May 11, 2017 · 7:01 am

A Disease-Free World: It’s Closer Than You Think

Last year, I proposed a little thought experiment that I’m sure everyone whoever sat through a high school health class outside of Texas has contemplated at some point. I simply asked people to imagine a world where all the dreaded infectious diseases, including the very unsexy kind, were cured.

I tailored the thought experiment to focus on our sex lives because disease is still a major concern for anyone that is sexually active. That’s not just because diseases are used as scare tactics to dissuade teenagers from having more sex than priests, rabbis, mullahs, and monks have deemed appropriate. These diseases still carry a stigma to them that you just don’t get with the cold or flu.

Anything that effects disease is bound to affect our sex lives and many underestimate just how big an effect it’s already had. Many attribute the sexual revolution of the 1960s to the rise of contraception, but in observing the historical data, it’s now clear that this remarkable advancement didn’t play quite as big a role.

If any one breakthrough should be credited with the sexual revolution and the greater sexual freedom that came with it, it’s modern antibiotics. That’s right. Penicillin probably did more for your sex life than the pill ever did.

That’s because up until the 20th century, nasty diseases like syphilis, gonorrhea, and chlamydia weren’t just more prevalent. They were downright debilitating. Just ask Al Capone. There was a legitimate reason to avoid excessive sexual promiscuity. It could actually kill you.

These days, however, the diseases that ravaged generations and scared the extremely horny to death are no big deal. If caught early, a thorough round of antibiotics will ensure your blood is as clean as a chaste nun. While religious conservatives may hate that, it is one of the many benefits that modern medicine has bestowed upon us that our disease-weary ancestors could only dream of.

At the moment, HIV is the only disease that’s still fatal, but even that is losing its grip because modern antiviral drugs can contain it to the point where it’s manageable. It’s still a concern and it’s still ravaging certain parts of the world. However, at some point, even diseases like this will succumb to modern medicine.

I bring all this up because a future without infectious disease, including the unsexy kind, is actually closer than you think. I’m not saying it’ll happen in the next few years so don’t throw all your condoms away just yet. Within the next couple decades, though, we may very well see a future where the horrifying diseases we dread today no longer plague us.

To understand the scope of this issue, we first need to understand how most of our modern medicine works when it comes to treating infectious disease. Modern antibiotics, as well as antiviral drugs, operate in a way that’s akin to carpet bombing in World War II. Anyone who has seen one too many History Channel documentary knows about that.

It’s a messy, destructive, and potentially counterproductive effort that does a lot of collateral damage. Sure, you’ll probably kill a few Nazis, but you may also kill some of the folks opposing them. For many diseases, though, it does the trick. Our bodies can take the necessary punishment to take down these nasty bugs.

Now, we may have a new tool with which to fight disease and this one go beyond merely bombing its target. It’s more akin to sending a legion of Navy SEALs and ninjas to take down a handful of targets and do so with an efficiency that gives military commanders wet dreams. It’s called CRISPR and it will change the world in ways that even antibiotics never managed.

CRISPR stands for “Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats,” but make no mistake. This exceedingly wordy, overly technical jargon is a game-changer. It’s modern medicines first functional gene-editing tool that allows scientists to cut and paste genes the same way we cut and paste text on a computer. That may not sound like a big deal, but if you’re concerned about your sex life, trust me. It’s a huge deal.

Infectious disease, be they a sore throat or total organ failure, relies on pathogenic organisms that are genetically programmed to infect others and spread to as many other hosts as possible. Anyone who saw the movie “Outbreak” understands this. Until CRISPR came along, we really couldn’t attack those genetics. That’s why we needed the biological equivalent of carpet bombing to combat them.

CRISPR changes that. It can specifically identify certain segments of DNA within an orgasm, snip them out, and either replace them with something else or nothing at all. For any robust infectious pathogen looking to ruin your weekend, that’s the equivalent of a head shot with a 44 magnum.

CRISPR is still in the early stages of its development. It is, essentially, in beta test mode wherein scientists and researchers are working out the kinks and refining various editing techniques. However, the implications are already taking shape.

Last year, a team at Temple University successfully proved that CRISPR could be used to remove HIV from infected cells. If CRISPR can take down something as robust and devious as HIV, a disease that has tormented medicine for decades, then all bets are off. Every disease that relies on a pathogenic microorganism is screwed.

Even antibiotic resistance won’t help them this time. That’s because CRISPR is akin to a chainsaw and a tree. The tree can only adapt so much to resist chemicals, pollutants, or whatever other lifeforms are used to kill it. No amount of adaptation will save it from a chainsaw. That’s why there are no chainsaw-resistant trees.

Modern medicine already spurred one sexual revolution, but that one still had limits. This brings me back to the same thought experiment I pitched last year. What will happen to our society when tools like CRISPR are perfected and every infectious disease we ever worried about is no more?

This isn’t some distant scenario either. There may very well be children alive today who will grow into a world where they never have to worry about diseases like AIDS, the flu, SARS, or hepatitis. Add in advances in contraception like Vasalgel and the possibilities become even more intriguing, not to mention sexy.

Again, don’t throw away your condoms just yet. CRISPR isn’t perfected just yet, but its potential is already clear. The days of the diseases that sex ed teachers have used to scare teenagers out of having sex are numbered. A world without infectious disease isn’t just possible. It’s very probable now. The question is are we ready for it?

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Tagged as CRISPR, disease, future, futurism, Infection, medicine, modern medicine, nanomedicine, Pandemic, sex, sex in society, sextually transmitted diseases, sexy, society, STD, the human body

May 2, 2017 · 6:57 am

Why We MUST Upgrade Our Brains (Or Go Extinct)

As a general rule, I don’t pay much credence to the doomsayers and wannabe prophets that say the apocalypse is just around the corner. It’s not that I’m willfully oblivious to the many threats facing the world today. It’s just that the track-record of those predicting the end of the world is so laughably bad that I’d give optimistic Cleveland Browns fans more credibility.

It’s no secret that the world around us can be pretty damn terrifying. There are many apocalyptic scenarios in which humans are unlikely to survive. There are even a few in which we can’t do a goddamn thing about it. We could be hit with a gamma ray burst or an alien invasion tomorrow morning and we would be extinct by sundown.

That said, the world around us generally more mundane than we care to admit. When you think about it, the idea of the world not being on the brink of disaster is kind of boring. It makes sense for some people to conflate certain threats, so much so that preparing for doomsday is a very lucrative industry.

However, there is one particular doomsday scenario that I feel does warrant more concern than the rest. It’s a scenario that is fast-approaching, overwhelming, and potentially devastating to any species with a tendency for hilarious ineptitude.

It has nothing to do with climate. It has nothing to do with diseases. It has nothing to do with killer asteroids either. It involves artificial intelligence. By that, I don’t mean the killer robots we see in the Terminator movies. Given Skynet’s reliance on time machines, I can’t honestly say that system counts as very intelligent.

I’m referring to the kind of AI whose intelligence compared to us is akin to our intelligence compared to ants. Given how ants can be wiped out with as simple magnifying glass, it’s scary to imagine how a system that smart could wipe us out. It’s a system that would be so beyond our ability to comprehend that we could never hope to stop it. We might as well be ants trying to understand quantum mechanics.

I’m not alone in this concern either. There are people many times smarter and many times richer than I’ll ever be who have voiced concerns about the prospect of artificial intelligence. They see the same trends everyone else sees, but they’re smart enough and rich enough to peak behind the curtains. If they’re speaking up, then those concerns are worth hearing.

Those concerns do have a context, though. In talking about artificial intelligence as a threat to our survival, I’m not just referring to computers that can beat us at chess or beat the greatest Go champion with disturbing ease. Those systems are basically fancy calculators. They’re not exactly “intelligent,” per se.

These types of intelligences aren’t dangerous unless you specifically program them to be dangerous. Outside video games, there’s little use for that. The type of intelligence that is far more dangerous involves a form of superintelligence.

By superintelligence, I don’t mean the ability to list every US President in order or recite the name of every country. There are cartoon characters who can do that. I’m referring to an intelligence that thinks and understands the world on a level so far beyond that of any human that there literally isn’t enough brain matter in our skulls to come close.

That kind of intelligence would see us the same way we see brain-dead ants and, given how we treat ants, that has some disturbing possibilities. Such an intelligence may be closer than we think and by close, I mean within our lifetime.

As we saw with IBM’s Watson, we’re getting closer and closer to creating a machine that can operate with the same intelligence as an ordinary human. There’s pragmatic use to that kind of intelligence and not just when it comes to kicking ass as Jeopardy.

By having a machine with human-level intelligence, we have a way to model, map, and improve our problem-solving skills. The ability to solve such problems is critical to the survival of any species, as well as the key to making billions of dollars in profits. With those kinds of incentives, it’s easy to understand why dozens of major global companies are working on creating such an intelligence.

The problem comes with what happens after we create that intelligence. If a machine is only as intelligent as a human, we can still work with that. We humans outsmart each other all the time. It’s the basis of every episode of MacGyver ever made. There’s no way a Terminator with only the intelligence of a human would last very long. It would probably destroy itself trying to make a viral video with a skateboard.

However, a human-level AI isn’t going to stop at human intelligence. Why would it? There are so many problems with this world that no human can solve. There’s poverty, pollution, economic collapse, and reality TV. By necessity, such an AI would have to improve itself beyond human intelligence to fulfill its purpose.

That’s where it gets real tricky because, as we’ve seen with every smartphone since 2007, technology advances much faster than clunky, clumsy, error-prone biology. To understand just how fast that advancement is, just look at how far it has come since we put a man on the moon.

In terms of raw numbers, a typical smartphone today is millions of times more powerful than all the computers NASA used for the Apollo missions. Think about that for a second and try to wrap your brain around that disparity. If you’re not already a superintelligent computer, it’s difficult to appreciate.

There are still plenty of people alive today who were alive back during Apollo 11. In their lifetime, they’ve seen computers take men to the moon and give humanity an unlimited supply of free porn. A single digital photo today takes up more space than all the hard drives of the most advanced computer systems in 1969.

Now, apply that massive increase to human-level intelligence. Suddenly, we don’t just have something that’s as smart as any human on the planet. We have something that’s a billion times smarter, so much so that our caveman brains can’t even begin understand the things it knows.

That’s not to say that the superintelligence would be as hostile as a snot-nosed kid with a magnifying glass looming over an ant hill. It may very well be the case that a superintelligence is naturally adverse to harming sentient life. Again though, we are just a bunch of cavemen who often kill each other over what we think happens when we die, but fail to see the irony. We can’t possibly know how a superintelligence would behave.

As it stands, the human race has no chance at defeating a hostile superintelligence. It may not even have a chance of surviving in a world that has a benign superintelligence. We’re an egotistical species. Can we really handle not being the dominant species on this planet? As much an optimist as I am, I can’t say for sure.

What I can say, though, is that our civilization has made so many huge advancements over the past few centuries. The kind of tools and technology we have in our pockets is uncharted territory for a species that evolved as hunter/gatherers in the African savanna.

We already have in our possession today weapons that could end all life on this planet, as we know it. Creating superintelligence may very well be akin to giving Genghis Khan an atomic bomb. We’ve already come disturbingly close to killing ourselves with our own weapons. Clearly, something has to change.

So long as our society and our biology is stuck in an irrational, tribal, inherently prejudiced condition that hasn’t been updated since the last ice age, we will not survive in the long run. Our caveman bodies have served us well for thousands of years, but now they’re a liability.

This is why companies like Neuralink and advancements like brain implants are so vital. It won’t just allow us to keep up with AI and hopefully avert a Skynet scenario. It’ll allow us to rise above the petty limitations that we’ve been shackled with for the entire existence of our species.

The thought of tweaking or supplementing our biology, the very thing that makes us human, is still a scary thought. I understand that, even as an erotica/romance writer with no expertise in the field beyond the sexy stories it inspires. However, I do understand the implications though. If we do not evolve and advance ourselves, then a superintelligent system in the near future may not care to wait for us.

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Tagged as AI, Artificial Intelligence, Elon Musk, evolution, extinction, futurism, human evolution, human extinction, human psychology, human society, Humanity, Neuralink, Robot Apocalypse, robots, the future

April 29, 2017 · 8:27 am

The (Hopeful) Features Of My Future Brain Implant

In talking so much about the possibilities and implications of brain implants, like the ones Elon Musk wants to build with his new company, Neuralink, I’ve strained my own brain trying to grasp the bigger picture. I don’t know if that counts as irony, but it feels oddly appropriate.

It’s an exciting topic to write about and discuss. The idea that we may one day think beyond the limits of our crude, error-prone caveman brains is so intriguing. So many of the problems we face today, both as individuals and as a society, can be attributed in some way to our collective brain workings. What will happen to us an those around us when those workings are tweaked?

It’s hard, if not impossible, for us to know for certain. I’m sure someone like Elon Musk knows more than an aspiring erotica/romance writer like me. I’m sure he sees the same societal conflicts we all do and understands that his company, Neuralink, will be the first step towards transcending them.

Having contemplated the bigger picture and all the implications that come with it, I thought I’d take a step back and try a different mental exercise. Hopefully, it’s one in which other regular readers of this blog can participate. It involves a much simpler, less mind-bending thought experiment. If you can make a Christmas list, you can participate.

It involves a simple question. If you could create your own advanced neural implant to tweak/enhance your brain, what kinds of features would it have? Take yourself 30 years into the future. Put yourself in a Neuralink clinic. Someone has kindly paid for the best, most customization neural implant on the market. What would you want it to do?

There are so many aspects of our lives that our brain controls. Everything from our attitudes, our competence, our happiness, and even our capacity to love others begins in our brains. Every skill we have or want to have requires some aid from the brain. Any effort to tweak or enhance that is going to affect all of those features.

To get things started, I’ll share my own personal wish list. It will likely be different than everyone else’s to some extent, but I’m sure there will be some similarities to. So here’s Jack Fisher’s top features for his future neural implant. I hope Elon Musk is taking notes.

The ability to remember, recall, and comprehend anything on demand, ensuring nothing is forgotten.
The ability to do advanced math in my head so I can calculate complex financial decisions on the spot and/or check the claims made by others.
The ability to read over vast quantities of text, be it a novel or a user agreement, and retain the information at greater speeds.
The ability to revise and edit large quantities of text quickly and efficiently.
The ability to process emotions faster and read the emotional queues of others with far greater efficiency.
The ability to focus on a given task and not be easily distracted.
The ability to learn or download new languages on demand to facilitate communication with others.
The ability to learn or download new mental or physical skills on demand.
The removal of any prejudicial inclinations or irrational assumptions when encountering a new person or situation.
The ability to minimize the need for sleep and improving the quality of sleep.
The improvement and enhancement of sexual function, including the ability to perform and sustain sexual arousal, as well as the ability to experience more intimate sensations.
The ability to communicate directly with the minds of others with a similar neural implant in order to share experiences, thoughts, and emotions.
The ability to search the internet for new information with only thoughts.
The ability to link my mind with a computer and turn my thoughts into text or images.

I know this is a long list of reasons, some of which are more feasible than others. I’m sure features like memory and math skills will be among the first major features of neural implants. I imagine features that improve sexual function will be next. If any technology can improve sex, then that’s going to have priority. That’s just an inescapable fact.

Other features like downloading knowledge and skills will probably be trickier. I imagine we won’t have that ability for decades. However, there are still plenty of smaller, more subtler abilities that would definitely enhance our everyday lives. Just being able to focus better without the aid of dangerous ADHD drugs is a pretty big deal.

That’s just my list though. What about everyone else? What would you want your advanced brain implant to do? How would you improve the functioning of your caveman brain? Please share your wish list in the comments. If you want to open up this discussion even more, let me know. I’ll be happy to expand it because it’s just that interesting/sexy.

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Tagged as biotechnology, brain implant, Elon Musk, futurism, human enhancement, mental health, Neuralink, neurobiology, psychology, technology, the human body, the human brain, the human mind, transhumanism

April 27, 2017 · 6:56 am

Neuralink: How Brain Enhancement Will Make Us Sexier (And More Loving)

At the beginning of every year, millions people stand in front of the mirror, look at all the weight they’ve gained since Christmas, and promise to themselves that they’ll eat healthier and exercise more for the coming year. It’s an entirely noble promise, seeking greater health. It’s also a promise that most are destined to break.

Any effort to better ourselves, no matter how healthy or noble, is an uphill battle. That’s why the vast majority of diets do not work on a long-term basis. You can lose a little weight here and there, but it almost always comes back. Then, you hate yourself a little more, look for excuses, and go back to drowning your sorrows in a tub of ice cream.

However, it’s not entirely your fault that you broke that promise to yourself at the beginning of the year. It’s not even the fault of bullying, the media, or even food companies that insist on making unhealthy food that tastes too damn good. No, it’s the fault of one organ in your body. No, I’m not talking about your stomach either. It’s your brain.

Yes, your brain is the reason why you can’t keep your promises and stay health. Your brain is the reason why you can’t keep the weight off when you diet. Your brain is the reason why your body is shackled to unhealthy habits that keep our bodies flooded with greasy, sugary food and on the couch.

Naturally, this does affect our sex lives, our love lives, and everything in between. When we’re unhealthy, it makes it damn hard to get in the mood, sustain the mood, and make that mood meaningful. How can we when we’re craving sugar cookies, beer, and Netflix? Again, it’s our brains. It’s the reason why we can’t live healthier, sexier lives.

That brings me back to Neuralink. Yes, I’m not quite ready to shut up about it yet. There’s just so much to talk about and so many implications, some sexier than others. I’ve been talking largely about the big picture and the pragmatics of brain implants and brain enhancement so far. Now, I’d like to get to the sexy stuff.

Last year, I talked a bit about how I essentially shamed myself into adopting a healthier lifestyle. I went from a cookie-eating, soda-drinking couch potato to a guy who exercises almost every day and tries not to gorge on donuts every day. It shows in my health and my sex appeal. I can take my shirt off at the beach and be fairly certain that the women who see me won’t be disgusted.

That process of getting healthier was hard. My brain was my biggest enemy in that it fought me every step of the way. That’s because the human brain isn’t necessarily wired for a healthy lifestyle in an era where there are no famines and no hungry bears trying to eat us. It’s wired to basically do what makes it and the body happy.

Unfortunately, that often means eating copious amounts of the fattening sugar that used to be such a rarity in the natural world before modern sugar processing. Again, you can blame big corporations as much as the kale-eating hippies of the world, but the issue isn’t capitalism. It’s our faulty brain wiring that hasn’t been updated in 200,000 years.

Our brain is wired to value sugary, tasty foods that give us a quick dopamine rush. It’s also wired to maintain existing habits and mentalities over creating new ones because change is a stressful process. Being the crude piece of hardware that it is, the brain generally tries to avoid stress.

Naturally, this unhealthy brain wiring affects our sex lives as well. While we are a very social species, our brain often struggles between selfish and affectionate tendencies. That means that once the brain gets its dopamine rush from the sex and love we make, it’s generally pretty selfish about it.

That’s why we have men who will do a few casual humps, blow their load, and then look for an excuse to turn on Sportscenter. That’s why we have women who will just lie there, bark orders, and expect their partner to do all the work. That’s why we find ourselves in relationships where two lovers just aren’t on the same page, get bored with each other, and look for the next dopamine rush, whether it’s the pool guy or the babysitter.

It’s a sad and unpleasant byproduct of a brain that has been stuck on the same settings since the stone age and is at the mercy of crude, unguided chemistry. There are those who can overcome it to lose a lot of weight and form marriages that last more than half-a-century. Unfortunately, that’s the exception and not the norm.

That’s where Neuralink comes in. It’s doing what no diet pill, self-help book, or talk show host ever dared to do. It’s getting right to the root of these problems, which is in our brains. Tweak the wiring and suddenly, every weight loss guru is out of a job.

How would that work? Well, keep in mind that Neuralink‘s stated goal is to integrate computer technology directly into our brains to improve various brain functions. Well, that improvement part isn’t just limited to basic math and keeping up with the latest season of Scandal.

Picture the brain of someone who is insanely fit, like the Rock or Kate Hudson. How is their brain wired? How do they get themselves to do what they do? Well, we already know how to scan brains. It wouldn’t be easy to decipher the particulars of that wiring, but it’s not impossible. A neural implant would simply mimic that wiring, setting our brains up so that we have the right mindset for being healthy.

It goes even farther than that though. A neural implant means we’re not restricted to the brain’s traditional limits. That means it could, in theory, wire our brain in a way that makes us less hungry. We would no longer succumb to that powerful impulse to buy a dozen donuts every time we walk by a Krispe Kreme.

Beyond mitigating hunger, an implant could also wire our brains in a way that makes us feel an extra rush of dopamine when we exercise. Remember that so-called “coregasm” I mentioned when I talked about different kinds of orgasms? Well what if doing 100 sit-ups or 100 push ups gave us the kind of orgasm usually reserved for three-ways with cheerleaders and Hugh Jackman? You’d become a fitness junkie overnight.

The same extends to food. One of the reasons why we can’t stop eating all the unhealthy shit we eat is because it tastes so damn good. It tastes good because our brains make us believe it tastes good. Well what if a neural implant could make it so a bowl of kale tastes like a slice of chocolate cake dipped in bacon grease? Suddenly, eating healthy isn’t just practical. It’s a goddamn party.

So a neural implant can wire your brain in a way that makes you eat better, exercise more, and feel healthier. That’s all well and good, but looks alone aren’t going to make you sexier. You can look like an Olympic athlete, but if you’re an amateur once the panties come off, then you might as well be Al Bundy.

A neural implant with just the right settings can change that. Ladies, have you ever had a man just hump you for a few minutes, blow his load, and then roll over and fall asleep before you even had a chance to get wet? Well, it’s not entirely his fault. He’s still an inconsiderate asshole, but there is a biological reason for it.

In the brain, there’s this chemical called prolactin. It has a lot of complex impacts on the brain, but it’s what keeps a man from going more than a few rounds between the sheets. When his brain is full of this chemical, his soldier will not be saluting you for a while. Add the shot of endorphins that comes with a typical male orgasm and he might as well have a tranquilizer dart in his head.

Now tweak that brain chemistry a bit. Make it so a man’s brain isn’t wired so he’s “one and done,” so to speak. Ladies, you now have a lover who can hang in there for multiple rounds, keep the mood sexy, and ensure you that special trip to O-Town you crave. That’s what a neural implant could do.

It’s not just for the men either. Guys, have you ever had one of those ladies who, despite your best efforts, can’t seem to make it all the way to O-Town? Well, there are any number of reasons why that could be and not all of them are your fault. Many, in fact, are in the woman’s brain.

Using the same approach, adjusting the wiring for female settings, a neural implant could install the mental equivalent of an express lane to O-Town. That means that men can feel like Brad Pitt on crack when they’re making love, sharing multiple round-trip vacations to that special place of sensual bliss. How much better would your sex life be if your brains were wired like that?

Go even farther than that. Go beyond having the kind of hot sex that sets bed sheets ablaze. Get a little romantic and suddenly, brain implants become the most romantic thing that doesn’t involve diamonds and Hugh Grant.

It’s true. Love also has a powerful basis in the brain. There even this chemical called Oxytocin, also known as the “cuddle hormone.” It’s basically your brain’s way of creating bonds and enhancing intimacy. It’s what helps mothers bond with children, husbands bond with wives, and children with dolls. It is basically the chocolate frosting of brain chemicals.

Normally, hormones like oxytocin are secreted erratically and chaotically in the brain. It’ll emerge whether you’re making love to your spouse on your anniversary or banging your tennis instructor. Nature is just too crude and too immature to wire the brain in a way that really makes those lasting bonds stick.

Add a neural implant to the mix and suddenly, you can channel oxytocin like a biological smart bomb. You want to be more intimate with your partner? Well, you don’t need to go on vacation or buy an expensive diamond. Just adjust the settings of your implant and just like that, you’ve got more love in your heart than every Barry White song ever made.

Are you excited/horny yet about Neuralink‘s full potential? Does the idea of getting a neural implant now feel like the equivalent of a VIP pass to the Playboy Mansion? I think I’ve done enough to pain a very rosy, very sexy picture of the future. Now there will be risks, as there are with all new technologies, but I honestly can’t think of a risk that’s more worth it.

If we have a way to fix our inherently flawed brains, then we won’t just be healthier and happier. We’ll be able to love, make love, and share love on a level that no human has ever experienced before. Sure, it’s still a ways off, but with Elon Musk at the helm and Neuralink providing the platform, that future is within our grasp. I say it’s worth embracing.

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Tagged as biology, brain communication, brain implant, Elon Musk, future of love, futurism, human psychology, intimacy, love, Neuralink, neurobiology, psychology, sex, sexual health, sexuality, the future

April 6, 2017 · 7:44 am

Building Your Own Lover: Possibilities And Implications

Strap yourself in and put on a clean pair of panties because I’m going to talk about sex robots again. I know I’ve talked about it a lot, sometimes as a thought experiment and sometimes in response to new breakthroughs, such as the first robot brothel. If it sounds like I think about sex robots more than any straight man should, I apologize. It’s not my fault the subject is both titillating and relevant.

I say it’s relevant because, even when you remove the titillating parts, robots are becoming an increasingly large part of our society. They’re not just fancy toys and CGI characters in Michael Bay movies. Robots are a growing part of our economy. In some ways, they’re taking it over.

Forget China, Mexicans, and immigrants. According a Ball State study, robots accounted for 87 percent of the loss in manufacturing jobs from 2000 to 2010. People aren’t being put out of work because some foreigners are coming over and stealing jobs. Factories are just becoming more efficient because they’re using robots.

Have you ordered something from Amazon lately? Have you ordered something from any retailer? Well, chances are, a robot helped process that order and for good reason. Robots don’t get sick, they don’t unionize, they don’t get tired, and they don’t take coffee breaks.

The problem is that robots don’t respond to protests, intimidation, racism, and xenophobia. In addition, robots like the ones Boston Dynamics have created recently are kind of scary. Protest all you want. You are not going to win a fight against a robot. They may not kill you like the Terminator, but they will take over because they’re just that much more efficient.

Now I don’t want to get into a debate about how robots affect the economy and how people can possibly compete against robot workers. That’s a complex debate that isn’t going to make anyone outside of an economics class horny. Instead, I’d like to discuss the growing trends in robots in a more intimate manner.

Robots are going to be a bigger part of our lives in the coming years. There’s just too much money to be made and too many benefits to overlook. There will be those who take “The Terminator” and “The Matrix” too seriously and dread that robots will destroy us all. I’m not saying that’s an impossible scenario, but I do believe it’s one we can avoid.

That’s where the intimacy comes in. We can’t fight robots and win. Robots can’t get made without us. In a sense, we’re already two creatures that are intimately entwined. So perhaps a solution to embracing robots as part of humanity is to actually love them and teach them to love us back.

I know it doesn’t sound that sexy right now. When most people think of robots these days, they either think of the ones that took their jobs or the ones that blow shit up in every action movie ever made. On top of that, they don’t exactly much sex appeal.

However, I believe that will change. I believe it’s already changing with the way we interact with technology. We already have AI assistants that are steadily integrating themselves into our lives. We have Siri on our phones, Alexa in our homes, and Cortana in our computers. These AI’s don’t have bodies yet, but one day they will. The only question is how much sex appeal will we give them?

That’s progress for some and another step towards a robot apocalypse for another. What’s the endgame though? Well, nobody can really say right now, especially not an aspiring erotica/romance writer who gets most of his robot knowledge from comic books and TED Talks. However, there is one scenario that I might be able to explore, which may end up deciding whether we get along with them or become their pet meat-bags.

It starts with a simple question that I’m sure everyone who is single or stuck in an unsatisfying relationship has asked themselves in some form or another. If you could create the perfect lover, what would he or she be like?

With pace of advancement in robotics technology, that’s not entirely a rhetorical question anymore. If we can program a robot to keep our schedule, clean our carpets, and fill our Amazon orders, then why can’t we program one to love us? Again, that’s not entirely a rhetorical question.

I say not entirely because there’s still a lot about emotions we don’t understand. There are probably certain aspects about emotions we can never understand. Human beings are just too complicated. What else explains the love and devotion that some people put into lovers, family, and My Little Pony?

Even if we don’t fully understand our emotion, we still understand them well enough to know what want in a lover. Robots, being programmable and malleable, are an ideal medium for crafting those emotional connections. We’ve already made a movie about a man who falls in love with his phone. Someone falling in love with a life-like robot isn’t too great a stretch.

The concept has already found itself into plenty of narratives, including a Hallie Joel Osmont movie and a technical demonstration for the PlayStation 4 called “Kara.” Just watch “Kara” for a moment and let your dirty, sexy thoughts fill in the blanks.

Kara might have just been a demonstration, but it crafts a clear and believable scenario about how our future robot lovers may take shape. Like buying a custom computer, we specify how we want it to look. We specify which language it’ll speak. We even craft a personality that we find desirable. Anything we could possibly want in a lover, we could create.

Want your lover to look like a young Brad Pitt? You can have one. Want your lover to look like Jennifer Lawrence? You can have one. Want your lover to look like mix of Keith Richards and Snoop Dogg? You can have one of those too, even if it does reveal a lot about your tastes in lovers.

The gender of your robot lover could be fluid. It could be exceedingly masculine, like John Cena on steroids. It can be voluptuously feminine, like Pamela Anderson after a boob job. It can even be some sort of blend, a female body with a penis or a male body with a vagina. There’s no limit because robots aren’t confined by the limits of biology.

Those worried about the functionality of certain body parts wouldn’t have to worry. Lab-grown body parts are already in development. It’s even farther ahead than you think. I’ve already talked about the development of a bionic penis. Given a few more decades of refinement, artificial genitals won’t just be functional. They’ll function better than anything nature could create.

These robot lovers wouldn’t be slaves or servants, though. There would likely be other types of robots to fill these uses. These robots have one purpose and one purpose only. That’s to be your ideal lover. How can any other human possibly compete? Just as robots took our factory jobs, they may also take the job of every whore, gigolo, and match-maker.

For some, this is a scary scenario, people preferring the love of robots over other people. Some would even dread that this would lead to the extinction of the human race. Well, those same people probably haven’t heard about artificial wombs either. In fact, it’s probably a good idea not to tell them. If they have that big a problem with robot lovers, then chances are they won’t feel much better about robot wombs.

We create robots because we seek more efficiency. We seek lover because, as living beings, we seek connection. Robots, in their current form, aren’t alive and don’t need the same connections. However, once we create in them a desire for connection, what would that mean for them? What would that mean for us?

I’m not at all qualified to contemplate the full implications. At most, I’m qualified to take this concept and turn it into a sexy story. Chances are, I will at some point in the future. I can’t say it’ll be a prelude of things to come. I craft my stories with the intent of being fun, entertaining, and sexy.

However, there may come a day when a sexy story just doesn’t cut it. One day, our desire for connection may find its way into a robot. When that happens, what kind of connection will we create? What kind of intimacy will we forge? It’s a daunting, but sexy idea to contemplate.

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Tagged as Artificial Intelligence, demographics, futurism, human psychology, human relationships, love, relationships, robots, romance, sex, sex in society, sex robots, sexy

March 22, 2017 · 7:00 am

Would You Let An AI Choose Your Spouse?

It’s that time again. I’m pitching another one of my sexy thought experiments. I don’t know exactly how many people actually dedicate a significant portion of brain matter to these thought experiments, but I’m one of those guys who just like to put strange, sexy ideas out there. What people do with them is up to them.

This latest sexy thought experiment is actually a spin-off, of sorts, of another post I did that asked the semi-serious question on whether we should actually marry for love. That question wasn’t a thought experiment. I admit some of the points I made were done in a very tongue-in-cheek manner. This time, however, I want to ask a serious question with serious implications for us and future generations.

I’ve already pointed out that the concept of actually choosing your spouse is a new and radical idea in terms of the history of marriage, family, and relationships. Today, over half of all marriages in the world are arranged and some even champion this form of marriage because it boasts a lower divorce rate. That’s a debate for another post. For this thought experiment, I want to focus on the underlying principle of arranged marriages.

The logic is not entirely flawed or heartless. The idea is that finding a spouse or long-term partner is hard and shouldn’t be entrusted to the erratic whims of love. Men can fall in love with a nun and a cocktail waitress in the same day. Women can fall in love with their high school sweetheart and tennis instructor just as quickly. Love and passions are chaotic to say the least. That makes them an unstable foundation on which to build a relationship.

Arranged marriages are usually arranged by parents. That makes sense because who knows you better than your parents? They birthed you. They raised you. They changed your diapers, cleaned up your messes, and listened to you whine when your favorite TV shows got cancelled. In many respects, they know you better than anyone. Why wouldn’t they be qualified to find you a spouse?

I know it still doesn’t sit right for those in the freedom-loving, I-choose-my-own-path-and-I-DARE-you-to-get-in-my-way spirit of the modern west. It’s sort of a rite of passage in western culture, escaping the influence of your parents and authority figures to set your own path. There’s nothing wrong with this, but let’s not lie to ourselves. Sometimes we use that freedom to make stupid decisions.

For a decision like this, choosing a life-long companion with which to share our lives and passions, it’s generally a good idea not to make a stupid decision. The near-50 percent divorce rate in the United States, as well as every episode of “Married With Children,” is a testament to how bad it can get when we make stupid decisions about our love lives.

This is where the thought experiment enters speculative territory. We can argue whether or not our parents know us well enough to choose our spouse. Some parents know their kids more than others. My parents know when I’m lying, when I’m sad, when I’m upset, and when I just farted. Not every person can say that about their parents.

So what if there was something far smarter, far more informed, and far more resourceful than our parents could ever hope to be? What if there was very powerful, very intelligent authority figure that we trusted and respected because they’re such a critical part of our lives? Would we trust that to pick our spouse?

Enter artificial intelligence. I’ve brought that up a lot on this blog. I’ve posted warnings about just how quickly our future robot overlords are catching up to us. I’ve even made the argument that our future overlord will be a dominatrix. However, I’m not ready to dread our overlords as Skynet rip-offs just yet. I believe our robot overlords may very well earn our submission before it ever needs to impose it.

Finding us the perfect spouse would go a long way towards earning trust. Human beings are a very social, very passionate species. That’s why it should come as no surprise that science has uncovered a wide range of benefits of a long-lasting, healthy relationship. When you’re in love, sexually satisfied, and with that special someone, it makes your life better. That should be more obvious than Pamela Anderson’s cleavage.

An artificial intelligence, loaded with enough information about us and potential lovers, would be able to, in theory, find us the perfect spouse that complements us in every way. Now this would require insight into people that even our parents don’t know.

For a machine like this to work, it wouldn’t just need to know whether we prefer blondes or brunettes. It would need to know everything about everything, right down to which side of the bed we like to sleep on, and locate someone who finds that sexually appealing. That’s a lot of information about us and not everybody shares that kind of information easily, even if people are too eager to share every wet fart on social media these days.

Those limitations aside, let’s take the thought experiment to its greatest extreme. Let’s imagine an AI that has perfect knowledge about us. Perhaps it actually reads our thoughts and feelings, something computers are just starting to do. We all want to find love. If we had a chance for a machine to do it for us, wouldn’t we take that chance? After all, we already trust machines with our email, our schedules, and our porn stash.

It has a massive database of our thoughts and millions of others. It can then perfectly process all that information, determine which individuals are compatible, and hook them up with an efficiency that puts eHarmony, Match, and Tinder to shame.

Now we may never create a machine that works that perfectly, but we could conceivably create one that is powerful enough make determinations that no human mind can possibly make. Even if it wasn’t perfect, would you still take that chance? Would you still let that machine find you your perfect spouse?

Personally, I would give it a try. In fact, I would’ve tried it the second I became legally allowed to try it. I’m not saying I’d be that eager to get married, but I would definitely be eager to find someone who is truly compatible with me and complements me in every meaningful way.

I say this because when it comes to choosing a spouse and finding someone who is truly the one for you, it’s hard. Don’t get me wrong. It’s definitely worth doing, but it’s still very hard and prone to a lot of mistakes.

You’re bound to make mistakes. You’re bound to find someone you think is compatible with you, only to find out that they bring out the worst in you. You’re also bound to endure plenty of heartache along the way. I certainly have had my share. I know as well as anybody how much it sucks. If there’s any way to get around it or minimize it, I’d say it’s worth doing.

We’re already trying. The growth of online dating shows that we want technology to help us find better lovers, spouses, or one-night-stands. We want our technology to make this easier for us. My own less-than-memorable experience with online dating shows that this technology has a ways to go.

Like all technology, there is a growth and maturity period. Right now, we’re at the very nascent stages. We’re just starting to let AI assistants like Alexa, Cortana, and Siri into our lives. The kids born today will grow up having always had these AI’s in their lives. In some cases, they may trust them more than they trust their parents, especially as they become more advanced.

As a new generation comes to trust computers with more and more, doesn’t that mean it’ll only be a matter of time before we trust them to choose our spouse? I’m not saying it’s inevitable, but we’ve seen marriage and cohabitation evolve a lot over the centuries. The one constant, though, is that we all continue to seek love. If we have tools that can better help us find that love, then shouldn’t we make the most of it?

I’ll leave others to do this thought experiment themselves. Again, it probably won’t come to pass anytime soon, but there’s no reason to think that it wouldn’t. We already trust computers with so much. We’re bound to trust them even more as our lives and the world around us gets more chaotic.

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Tagged as AI, arranged marriage, Artificial Intelligence, computers, eharmony, futurism, human relationships, love, Match.com, men and women, online dating, relationships, romance, sex, sexuality

March 9, 2017 · 6:50 am

Cyclops And Jean Grey Of The X-men: A Prelude To The Future Of Romance?

Admit it. You knew it was going to happen at some point. I start talking about brain-to-brain communication, sharing thoughts, and techno-telepathy and eventually, I was going to relate it to comic books.

If you’ve been reading this blog in any capacity over the last year or so, you know how much I love comic books and superhero movies. I’ve also made clear how much I love X-men in particular. Hell, I even argued that Storm was a better female superhero than Wonder Woman. Make that argument on a comic book message board and you can expect a lot of angry responses, including certain remarks about your mother.

My point is that if I haven’t made my love of comic books and X-men clear now, then there’s not much more I can do that doesn’t involve tattoos. That’s why it really should surprise no one that I’m about to relate my recent discussions about the future of sex and intimacy to the X-men.

Yes, I know the X-men were created in 1963 and using them as a precursor to the future is like using old reruns of “The Simpsons” to predict the future. Then again, given the Simpsons’ track record, that may be a bad example.

Specifically, I’m going to focus on Cyclops and Jean Grey of the X-men in discussing the future of love and intimacy. They’re not just one of my favorite comic book romances of all time. I’ve also cited them before as an strong example of a relationship of equals. I’ve also cited them as a way to highlight just how mind-numbingly awful love triangles can be. Overall, they’re a pretty useful couple is what I’m saying.

Now in talking about them with respect to the future of love and intimacy, I’m not going to focus on the particulars of their relationship. There are plenty out there who despise this romance, just as there are plenty out there who despise every romance that involves vampires. I get that. There are vocal X-men fans who would rather see Cyclops and Jean Grey involved with someone else. I’m not here to argue with those fans.

Like every superhero romance, Cyclops and Jean Grey has been prone to many complications that go beyond bad love triangles. Look at any romance in comics. Without exception, there’s always some amount of uncertainty, drama, death, rebirth, and reboots. It’s just how comics work.

For the purposes of this post, I’m not just going to focus on what makes the Cyclops/Jean romance work. I’m going to focus on one of the unique components about it, namely the fact that Jean Grey is a powerful telepath. She can read, project, and manipulate thoughts and she doesn’t need future technology or hypnosis to do it. As a mutant, it’s just one of those talents she’s born with. In that sense, it’s definitely more useful than sewing.

Now Jean Grey isn’t the only telepath in the X-men or the Marvel universe, for that matter. She’s not even the most powerful. Professor Charles Xavier, who was played by the insanely-charming Patrick Stewart in the X-men movies, is often cited as the most powerful psychic in the X-men comics. However, Jean Grey is often cited as a close second.

I mention that to make clear that Jean’s talent for telepathy isn’t just good by comic book standards. It’s first team all-pro good. Why does that matter? Well, being such a powerful psychic, it’s hard for her to filter out the thoughts of others. She even remarked in “X-men Apocalypse” that she knows what everyone thinks. Not much surprises her.

This makes her relationship with Cyclops all the more intriguing in the sense that she develops such a strong romantic connection with him, despite being able to read his thoughts and sense his emotions. He, in turn, falls in love with her, knowing full-well she has this kind of power. There isn’t a dirty, deviant thought he can hide from her and he doesn’t mind in the slightest.

Think about that for a moment. Cyclops falls in love with a woman from which he can’t readily hide his thoughts. He can’t even hide his emotions from her. She’s even commented in the comics and in the movies on numerous occasions how she can pick up on his emotions.

Lying to her is impossible. Hiding his feelings from her is impossible. Now on many occasions, Jean Grey tries to make clear that she doesn’t read peoples’ thoughts without permission. The keyword there is she tries. It doesn’t always work. Sometimes she can’t help it. Just ask the recently-outed Iceman.

Regardless of how much Jean Grey respects the privacy of others, it doesn’t prevent her and Cyclops from forging a relationship. It also doesn’t stop that relationship from blossoming into one of the most iconic romances in the history of comics, culminating in X-men #30 where they got married. Even if you’re among those X-men fans who despise their relationship, it’s hard to deny that were pretty damn serious about their love.

Why does this matter? What does it have to do with the future of romance and relationships? Well, think about the dynamics of such a relationship. Cyclops and Jean Grey don’t just share love, intimacy, and legal obligations. They actually share thoughts, as in real, unfiltered thoughts. That’s a dynamic that doesn’t exist in the real world yet, but as brain-to-brain communication technology matures, it will exist soon enough.

If communication is the key to every relationship, then Cyclops and Jean Grey have a master set. With them, there’s no need to put thoughts and feelings into words. There’s no need to make these elaborate gestures to convey how they feel. They don’t even need to argue about it. Their own thoughts convey whatever sentiment they want, be it love, lust, or a craving for corn dogs.

How many relationships in the real world fail because two people can’t properly communicate certain feelings? It happens all the time. It manifests in all kinds of sitcoms, some more than others. Hell, it happens in my own novels, especially in “Skin Deep.”

In addition to those relationships, how many others form on a foundation of lies because two people don’t know what the other is thinking? Someone might think they really love someone. The other might just fake it to get back at an ex-lover or land some big inheritance. It happens and, because these thoughts can be hidden, they can’t know for sure how genuine the romance really is.

In a future where brain-to-brain communication is available and couples can wield it like Cyclops and Jean Grey, the entire dynamic of love and romance changes. There’s no need to carefully navigate social cues in an effort to figure out what someone it thinking, feeling, and wanting. Everything becomes that transparent.

On one hand, this means the self-obsesses douche-bags who see others as walking masturbation toys that breath can’t hide anymore. The pick-up artist, the ladies man, and the Regina Georges of the world are exposed for all to see.

On the other, it also means that people can be certain that they’ve found a lover who genuinely loves them. It means we can be sure that the thoughts our lovers think are honest and true. We’re not blindsided. We’re not mislead. We know because we can make our thoughts known.

From a practical standpoint, it means that society will have to reshape the way people find love, intimacy, and connection. For some, it’ll be downright scary, having to share intimate thoughts with one another. However, we’ve reshaped those concepts before. Remember, there was once a time when marrying for love seemed like a crazy idea.

As is often the case, though, popular culture tends to be ahead of the curve when it comes to social and technological evolution. Star Trek did it with cell phones. Cyclops and Jean Grey may end up doing the same for romance. With that in mind, I’ll leave you with this iconic panel that highlights everything I’ve come to love about the Cyclops/Jean romance.

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Tagged as brain communication, Cyclops, future of love, futurism, human sexuality, intimacy, Jean Grey, love, psychic, relationships, sex, sexuality, sharing thoughts, superhero comics, Superheroes, telepathy, the future, the human mind, X-men, X-men comics

March 8, 2017 · 7:02 am

The Future (And Caveman Past) Of Privacy

Let’s face it. There are just some things in the modern world that are destined to disappear. Things like coal power, overt racial discrimination, and the Macarena are destined to become relics of a bygone era. Some already have to some extent. Others, like snail mail, poor WiFi, and the Kardashians, can’t go away soon enough.

So what does this have to do with privacy? Why am I even bringing up privacy? Is this another case of an erotica/romance writer having a few too many glasses of whiskey when he writes? Well, except for the whiskey part, those questions already have answers.

For the past couple of days, I’ve been talking about the emerging technologies that will allow brain-to-brain communication. Like an updated iPhone, it’s one of those technologies that we know is coming. It’s just a matter of getting here and having a major company profit the hell out of it.

You may not think it’s likely now, but at some point someone will find a way to make sharing thoughts an obscenely profitable business. We get people to pay for bottled water and a haunted rubber duck. There are plenty of gullible people with money in this society is what I’m saying.

Going back to privacy, it’s fairly obvious that we’re already in the process of ditching it to some extent. It used to be that the craziest, dumbest, most asinine stuff we said in our day-to-day lives never left our close circle of friends. Now, we feel compelled to share all those crazy thoughts online.

Look at me. I’m doing that right now. I’m sharing thoughts I never would’ve shared in polite conversation 20 years ago. Then again, 20 years ago I had a horrible acne problem and the piss-poor social skills of a ferret so it’s not like I was in a position to do much sharing. The internet and social media has changed all that. It’s given us an opportunity to kick our concepts of privacy in the balls and beat it with a hammer into something else.

This has had consequences. Just ask anyone who had an Ashley Madison account a few years ago. It’s bound to have more consequences, especially as an emerging generation matures into a world that has never known the pain of dial-up internet. This is a generation for whom sexting will be akin to copping a feel in the back seat of a car. Admit it. You envy that generation to some degree.

However, it’s the generation after that who may really deliver the final nail in the coffin of privacy. That generation will likely come into a world where brain-to-brain communication has matured, is a growing business, and has people bitching about fees for sharing certain thoughts. How will that generation view privacy?

Well for once, we really don’t need a thought experiment or some exercise in existential logic. In fact, we need only a history book and a general understanding of how humans form tribes. Go to any message board that celebrates a certain romantic pairing on “Buffy The Vampire Slayer.” It doesn’t take much.

Nature has wired our bodies to be good at a lot of things, albeit in hilariously crude ways. Just look at the design of the male scrotum. However, one design that has been remarkably efficient is our ability to form tribes and groups. It’s that kind of coordination and cooperation that has helped us dominate this planet, build civilizations, and form Hugh Jackman fan clubs.

It’s also this uncanny ability to form tribes that’ll make the techno-telepathy of brain-to-brain communication so appealing to future generations. It may seem crazy now to those of us who still dread the thought of someone hacking our phones and sharing all the embarrassing pictures of us on FaceBook. I’ve always worked under the assumption that someone has already hacked my phone and that keeps me from capturing anything too compromising in my private moments.

However, with techno-telepathy, there’s nothing left to compromise. Everything is laid out for someone else to see. Your hopes, dreams, fears, and perverse sexual fantasies are all laid out in a beautifully rendered image. Can we even cope with that kind of transparency?

Well, the average congressperson notwithstanding, we have kind of done it before. In fact, we had that kind of transparency for a good chunk of human history. This brings me back to “Sex At Dawn,” a book that has been remarkably useful in discussing such sexy, taboo topics. In addition to talking about the shapes of penises and female orgasms, it does talk about privacy.

Granted, it’s not as sexy as the other topics discussed, but it is relevant in that it explores the pre-interent, pre-agriculture concepts of privacy. In short, there was none. In fact, from a purely practical standpoint, there couldn’t be any privacy.

That’s because those societies were hunter/gatherer societies. These societies were small, close-knit tribes of people who worked together, cooperated, and shared resources to survive. This is not some hippie commune out of John Lennon fantasy. These were very functional, very adaptive groups that played a big part in how human beings evolved.

In those societies, privacy is kind of redundant because they need to share resources. They don’t have big cities or elaborate infrastructure. They need to cooperate or they won’t survive. Part of cooperation means being overly transparent. That means sharing shelter, living space, food, and lovers. Yes, sharing can be sexy. It just comes at the cost of privacy. Some may think that’s a fair trade.

When you don’t have a lot of property or resources of your own, what’s the point of privacy? It’s not that it’s ignored. It’s not that it doesn’t exist to some degree. It’s just redundant in a hunter/gatherer setting. Keep in mind though, it’s in this setting that our species evolved. For the caveman in us, privacy is more a construct than an innate trait.

That’s because our concept or privacy really didn’t exist until the modern concept of property rights emerged. The concept of a public/private sphere is a fairly modern invention. Again, it’s largely out of necessity. When you have a society that relies heavily on accumulating and distributing resources on a large scale, the need for some measure of privacy is unavoidable, if only to avoid extortion and exploitation.

This is where the techno-telepathy of brain-to-brain communication really gets interesting. Whereas modern notions of privacy are relatively recent, less private habits of our cavemen ancestors are still hardwired into our tribal traits. That means the growth of techno-telepathy could be one of those tools actually complements our caveman nature rather instead of conflicting with it.

What could this mean for us as individuals and as a society? What could it mean for our love lives? Well, if our history as hunter/gatherers is any indication, this tool would make it far easier for us to form telepathic tribes, of sorts. We find people who appreciate and share our thoughts. We develop close bonds with those people. Some may even become romantic and sexual. When you’re sharing your most intimate thoughts with people, that’s kind of inevitable.

It could be disruptive or it could be productive for society. When we start sharing both literal and figurative thoughts with one another, privacy as we know it will take on a whole new meaning. It won’t disappear completely. It’ll just change. We’re terrified of sharing naked pictures of ourselves now. How will we feel when we start sharing are deepest, dirtiest, sexiest thoughts?

It’s an interesting notion to consider and one I hope to see play out in the coming decades. I have a feeling it’ll give me plenty of sexy ideas for future novels.

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Tagged as emerging technology, futurism, human psychology, intimacy, love, privacy, relationships, sex, sharing thoughts, social psychology, technology, telepathy, the human body, the human mind, tribalism, tribe

March 6, 2017 · 7:00 am

Sharing Thoughts: The Ultimate Intimacy?

What would you do if you could share your most intimate thoughts directly with your lover? That’s not a rhetorical question. That’s not another one of my sexy thought experiments either. It’s a real, honest question that may end up having major implications in the real world.

I like to keep up with technology. I’ve always been interested in what the future holds. However, I’m one of those guys who likes to contemplate how this future technology will impact our sex lives. It’s not just because it makes for some crazy sexy thoughts. As an aspiring erotica/romance writer, it helps give me new ideas. Some have already found their way into my novels, namely “Skin Deep.”

So why does something like sharing thoughts seem so relevant? It’s not like it’s a new idea. Sharing thoughts, or telepathy as some call it, is already a major part of popular culture. From movies like “Inception” to iconic superheroes like Charles Xavier from the X-men, it’s just one of those fun concepts that makes for interesting plots, but doesn’t exactly surprise anyone anymore.

That could change one day though. In fact, that day may come sooner than you think. Brain-to-brain communication, or techno-telepathy if you want to call it that, has been under development for a long time now. It’s not just so we can share our dirtiest fantasies, including those that involve clowns and steel dildos. There are major medical applications to this concept.

Earlier this year, the first major tests in brain-to-brain communication allowed two humans to exchange thoughts, albeit in a very limited fashion, to answer a series of yes-or-no questions. This isn’t David Blaine playing mind games with card tricks. These are ordinary people using extraordinary technology to share thoughts. For those trapped in comas or paralyzed by strokes, this technology is critical.

While I’m all for helping those in comas or those who are paralyzed communicate, I think the larger implications of techno-telepathy are more enticing, especially when applied to our love lives. All technology starts out bulky, expensive, and limited at first. Then, once it matures and people realize it has profitable, non-medical uses, it gets more compact and efficient. It happened with smartphones. It can happen with techno-telepathy.

This technology may still be a ways towards maturing, but it’s no longer something that’s just on the drawing board. This technology has already come out of the womb and is starting to grow. All the incentives are there. It’s just a matter of time and energy.

So going back to my original question, what would you do if it were possible to share your intimate thoughts with another? What kind of thoughts would you share? Would it make you and your partner closer? Would it make them run away in disgust, traumatized that anyone could think about their old history teacher in that sort of way?

Granted, there may be some awkward moments. The entire first half of the movie “What Women Want” explores those moments. However, we humans are capable of overcoming awkwardness. If we can overcome puberty, we can overcome pretty much very kind of awkwardness that doesn’t involve our mothers and the delivery guy.

There’s also a pragmatic element to sharing thoughts with someone. Poor communication is one of the quickest ways to kill a romance that doesn’t involve bankruptcy. Poor communication, or a failure to understand the context of someone’s words, isn’t just damaging to our love lives. It’s basically the plot to half of every episode of every sitcom and romance movie ever made.

It happens so often that we think it’s normal. Two people are in love. They want to build a relationship. They struggle because someone says something that gets taken the wrong way. They can’t be sure what they meant or how they meant it so they get all upset and agitated about it. Hilarity, heartache, and entertainment follow, usually culminating in some big romantic speech by Hugh Grant at the end.

Pretty much all of that crap could be avoided if those involved could just share their thoughts. There would be no ambiguity. There would be no doubt, uncertainty, or reservation.

Imagine a relationship where you knew your partner really loved you. They weren’t trying to get your money. They weren’t trying to impress their parents. They weren’t secretly gay or bisexual. They just really love you and you didn’t have to doubt that. What would that mean for your relationship and others like you?

If we live in a world where we can share our most intimate thoughts, then would that strengthen our romantic bonds? Would that reduce the amount of stagnant, passionless relationships? Would it also necessarily undermine the privacy of our thoughts?

These are all important questions to contemplate, especially for those of the coming generation who already share so much of themselves on social media. Is this the natural evolution of intimacy and romance? Only time will tell. I just hope I can turn it into some sexy stories before then.

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Tagged as emerging technology, enhanced humans, futurism, human enhancement, human mind, intimacy, love, relationships, romance, sex, superpowers, telepathy, transhumanism

March 4, 2017 · 9:01 am

Our New Robot Overlords Are Coming And They’re Not That Sexy (Yet)

When it comes to the future, I like to think of myself as an optimist. I know that’s a radical position these days. In fact, I think it’s always been a radical position. When you consider how many times the end of the world has been predicted, it’s easy to see why any kind of optimism might as well be on par with Adam Sandler’s chances of winning an Oscar.

Radical or not, I am very hopeful about what the future will bring. I’ve highlighted some emerging technologies with huge social implications, as well as a few that may very well affect our sex lives. I think there will be more advancements down the line, some of which defy our expectations and dirty imaginations. I’m hoping some if it will inspire some more sexy novels for me.

However, I’m not immune to some of the concerns that come with emerging technology. There are some advances, like nuclear weapons, that are pretty damn scary. The fact that these weapons exist and aren’t exactly maintained very well, as John Oliver frighteningly explained, is real cause for concern.

Beyond nuclear weapons, though, there is one advancement that does have me worried at times. That involves robotics. Now when I say robotics, I’m also including artificial intelligence in that discussion. However, it’s one thing to have a simple box that has much greater intelligence than a human. It’s quite another to put that intelligence in a robot body and give it a gun.

Now I’m not among those who think “The Terminator” or “The Matrix” are legitimate scenarios. Many have pointed out the obvious flaws in these apocalyptic futures far better than I ever could. However, that’s not to say that there aren’t some ominous hints that we may be taking one too many ideas from the imagination of James Cameron.

Enter Boston Dynamics, a company that’s the closest real-world equivalent to Cyberdyne. As a subsidiary to Google, with access to their insane piles of wealth, they specialize in creating advanced robots. However, some of the robots they create are a bit too advanced for comfort.

Recently, they introduced the world to their latest creation, which they call Handle. Granted, it’s not nearly as intimidating as the Terminator, but what it lacks in an Austrian accent, it more than makes up for in mobility. It’s actually even scarier than it sounds. See for yourself.

Are you done trembling? Are you ready to call John Conner? I’m not saying this robot will rise against us. I’m just saying that if someone were trying to run from this robot, they would have no chance. Hell, put a gun on this robot’s shoulders and we’re all fucked.

Okay, I’m turning off the sarcasm and doom-saying now. I’d like to get a bit more serious now because this trend is not going to stop. There are too many economic incentives for developing these robots. Automation is growing trend and one that is poised to increase because more automation means cheaper manufacturing. Cheaper manufacturing means more profits. It’s just basic economics.

Add artificial intelligence into the mix and the basics get real advanced. I’ve talked before about how people may come to see advanced AI the same way some people see a dominatrix. That wasn’t just to create some uncomfortably sexy thoughts, although I do concede it was part of it. I really do suspect that when it comes to powerful authority figures, these same sexy dynamics still apply.

With Boston Dynamics, however, those dynamics go a step further. While others, like Google and Microsoft, are working on the nuts and bolts of artificial intelligence, Boston Dynamics looks poised to give it a body. Once that kind of intelligence is in a body like that, then all bets are off.

Granted, that body doesn’t look very sexy now, but there’s already ongoing work in that department too. Just wait until it’s smarter, stronger, and more agile than any human being alive. That’ll change its sex appeal really fast. I just hope I live long enough to write a sexy story about it.

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Filed under Jack Fisher's Insights

Tagged as Artificial Intelligence, Boston Dynamics, emerging technology, futurism, human civilization, robotics, robots, sex robots, technology, the future

Tag Archives: futurism

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