I love my computer. But do I love it enough for it to become my significant other? Not so much.

A story coming out of the Netherlands suggests that in about 40 years, robots will become the new-age romantic relationship of the future. Which begs the question: would you make love to something that looks like your iPod?

David Levy, the author of “Love+ sex with robots” believes that by 2048 robots will be upgraded from purely sex toy status to robots with human personalities, traits and emotions. This sort of feels like the premise of the Will Smith I, Robot movie, so does that mean the robots will go from lovers to programmed assassins?

For the more socially awkward, robot relationships may be a lot easier to deal with. And for the emotionally abusive types the robotic partner can be programmed to put up with all their unnecessary emotional/crap baggage and end up sparing another poor soul from being scarred for life.

The perks of having a robot lover might run along the lines of free Internet and TV and someone to vent to who won’t going crazy listening to repetitive cycle of speech. But at the end of the day I don’t know how many of us could look past the plastic exterior and find someone to love. In order to sell to a larger market, robots would be programmed to love you, never see any faults in you, and never pick fights. Frankly, having none of those qualities might make things kind of boring.

But if robots were programmed to reject the human partners it might send a lot of us into an emotional free fall. I mean, if a robot rejects you – chances are you’ll be swearing off both humans and robots all together.
—Eming Piansay