When would you like to find out someone is a robot?

[jolshefsky]

I was thinking about how my fembot fantasy scenario is based largely on being able to believe the entity before me is both actually mechanical and a convincing facsimile of a person. However, there seems to be a timing issue that's also important: there seems to be a "sweet spot" in the amount of time I know someone that I desire them to be an android.

So let's deal wholly in fantasy here ...

I meet some woman. (At this point, I like to pretend she is likely a robot, but it's not appealing for her to come out and say, "I'm a robot" ... well, a little, I guess.) So I spend some time getting to know her – maybe she works as a bartender, or we've gone on a date. (Right here, is when it would be ideal to find out she's a robot. I need to know her a little to believe the "convincing facsimile" part.) Over time we get to know one another better. (Finding out about human details makes me desire less that she's a robot.) Let's say we start dating in earnest. (After a month, I'd find it disconcerting that she's a robot; after a year I'd feel like I was tricked or being played; longer, and it feels kind of heartbreaking.)

Does that resonate with anybody else? Would anybody find it it appealing to be in a long relationship with someone (and I mean actually in a long relationship, not the fantasy "a long time passes") and find out your partner is a robot? What's important here is that the relationship is close, not just long-lasting – for instance, there are some women I know who I've known for years – but I don't know very well – who I'd like to find out they were actually androids. Not so with close friends or lovers.

I think that's why celebrities are so appealing: we can know them for a long time without knowing them much at all. They can be a "convincing facsimile" of a real person (wishes and dreams aside, they are all real people after all.) And then they're often above-average attractiveness, and often presented as fantasy objects.

[--NightBattery--]

Sounds like a copper top girl situation.
http://www.watch-tvseries.net/series290 ... r-Top-Girl

If that situation ocurred to me i'll probably feel a lot of responsability towards the machine well being despite the feeling of losing a flesh and spirit being that was meant to age and evolve with me.

Regards

[dale coba]

In a fantasy, it would be better not to find a lover/partner was a robot - too much deception and disappointment.

But how about the woman you know and like but have no play with. On campus, the mall or at work, she's too pretty or she's your second cousin by marriage or she's in a long-distance relationship with a jerk. If she left town, you'd miss her, but not much or for long.

In my fantasy, there isn't the shock and horror expressed typically by the fembot upon discovering her synthetic nature. In copying a human mind, would you leave in an intense fear of spiders? Nothing good is achieved by digitizing a mind without editing out a traumatic reaction to her very nature as a machine.

Even if you want to "transfer" a perfect copy and claim the product is the same person, we can now imagine programming which isolates and neutralizes that identity crisis - replacing what would have been her terror with arousal and orgasms! In earlier decades of stories, such precise programming seemed impossible. We couldn't imagine that just the attitude towards herself could be altered. Now, such mental editing should make obvious sense to anyone thinking about semi-self-aware, converted-to fembots.

So my neighbor/co-worker/whatev and I discover she's a robot, and she doesn't freak. Her attitude has been severely altered, she is welcoming her sub-human status as a machine. She's a Stepford fiancee in need of an Owner to husband her. I assert ownership, and why should a machine have objections to that assertion? Fear of spiders, objection to an Owner's orders - leave them out, no matter how strongly they drove the women when they were human.

- Dale Coba

[SunshineInTheGarden]

For me, it would be just a bit after I get to know her. If I get too attached to her personality, it would be difficult to cope with the fact that she's a robot.

[Saya]

It honestly depends on the situation for me. If it was a robot who was intentionally developed and programmed to deceive someone, as part of a weird experiment or something? That would probably make me feel used and betrayed, though ultimately I can't blame the robot for doing whatever it was programmed to do.

However, if it is a situation like "Well, I wanted to tell you, but I was worried you wouldn't like me anymore if I did", in my twisted psyche, that would be so very cute. Seriously, I'm sitting here all 'squee!' thinking about it. Don't ask me why, just is. But, I suppose then come the worries about cost of upkeep and all that, which would probably stress me out. Then I would be too worried about that and her own well being to do anything correlating to my kinks, so...

Still, as far as -when-? Ideally, at or around the second date. As early as possible into a possible relationship, because otherwise I have invested a lot of time into a relationship with someone that later turns out to be something else...whenever you do that, there are issues of trust brought up. Of course, that too brings out an interesting question. Would you feel like you could not trust your robotic lover after that? But hey, that's probably digressing...

[mangaman]

i agree with some of what saya was saying, it really depends on the character or situation, to me i kinda like the idea of discovery. but again it depends, my character might see this and get the idea of making her his now he knows shes vonurable or it could be opposite, say they dated or better yet she was his fiancee but before they get married he finds out she is a machine...you could feel betrayed yes, but at the same time would you be willing to throw it all away after becoming so close and in love, that element makes you think more about how to handle it or why she hid it from you for so long, plantation girls is a good example of this. but if it was say a second date , then ya he might let it slide, it might be a dream come true, but you dont really think about it as much vs. long term realationship, at that point he may either accept her and get past it, get angry, or reprogram her or alter her in some way making it into a fling. personally i like if you either find her remote and discover that way or by a malfunction

[Grendizer]

One of the great things about androids is that in theory, as long as you can trust their security, total honesty is a trivial risk. So I wouldn't even desire an android that played at being a human, unless it was known from the start, because that means there is deception involved at some level, or at least a certain amount of the unknown that could be negative. Frankly, I'd want to buy or build her, then use some kind of open source software of my own choosing to run her. I realize even using the term "open source" kind of cages things in a current-day context which may not accurately reflect the eventual reality, but there you have it. I want her to be my creation initially, in terms of personality and looks, with the option of developing into something else later, so that I know precisely what is going on and can guide the process. I think this could be just as fulfilling as a normal human relationship, because it doesn't actually exclude discovery/surprise later on. In fact, you could say it reverses the process, where security in the relationship is established first, then you get the pleasure of surprise and discovering something new in each other later.

The more I think about it, the more attractive that scenario sounds, although I do see the appeal in the traditional approach as well. It's only natural (and currently unavoidable).

[dale coba]

She'll have a detailed black box record of everything you did with her.

Many years later, the data will escape, like a sex tape or stolen credit card numbers.
Or the government will take it.

I think you want to avoid installing any wi-fi, and wipe most of her data very often. There are many tools which are less useful because of the datastream they create about their users - like cell phones and cars, constantly tracking your locations through time (data to be stored forever in government vaults).

- Dale Coba

[mangaman]

One of the great things about androids is that in theory, as long as you can trust their security, total honesty is a trivial risk. So I wouldn't even desire an android that played at being a human, unless it was known from the start, because that means there is deception involved at some level, or at least a certain amount of the unknown that could be negative. Frankly, I'd want to buy or build her, then use some kind of open source software of my own choosing to run her. I realize even using the term "open source" kind of cages things in a current-day context which may not accurately reflect the eventual reality, but there you have it. I want her to be my creation initially, in terms of personality and looks, with the option of developing into something else later, so that I know precisely what is going on and can guide the process. I think this could be just as fulfilling as a normal human relationship, because it doesn't actually exclude discovery/surprise later on. In fact, you could say it reverses the process, where security in the relationship is established first, then you get the pleasure of surprise and discovering something new in each other later.

The more I think about it, the more attractive that scenario sounds, although I do see the appeal in the traditional approach as well. It's only natural (and currently unavoidable).

good point but its just another senerio, i mean honestly, if it came right down to it id rather buy one or build to make her my own, rather than discover but either way id be cool with it

[daphne]

I should write a story where the husband finds out his wife is a robot, but on his deathbed.

Her: "Honey, I have something to tell you..." (opens stomach panel, exposing circuitry) "...all these years you've been screwing a machine."

Him: "MY LIFE!" (flatlines)

[Grendizer]

good point but its just another senerio, i mean honestly, if it came right down to it id rather buy one or build to make her my own, rather than discover but either way id be cool with it

You're right. I was just expressing that the given scenario doesn't "tick my box" so much. Although, in a world full of sentient free AIs, it would be more to my liking. An unfree AI would be a bit problematic. Whose purpose do you serve? Is there a conflict between our relationship and your real master? But before this, I'm a tinkerer. I like to mess with my tech, so having it handed to me like this in the wild and beyond my control isn't really my scene.

[xodar]

I'd like to know it ahead of time, but in any event I'd realize it if they didn't smell like flesh, hair, and breath. Or, likely, deodorant and perfume. Or if she were wearing a sleeveless top and were around continuously for several days without showing any bristles. Or having to eat or go to the bathroom...