The Future of Female

TREATMENT FOR A DOCUMENTARY FILM

August 25, 2008 CONTACT: BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION DIRECTOR/WRITER • Katherine Dodds EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/DIRECTOR ADVISOR Mark Achbar EXECUTIVE PRODUCER/PRODUCER Betsy Carson • [email protected] • 604.251.0770 EXECUTIVE PRODUCER—FRENCH MARKET Lucie Tremblay • [email protected] 514.281.1819

August 25, 2008

CONTACT: BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION

Director/Writer Katherine Dodds

Executive Producer/Director Advisor Mark Achbar

Executive Producer/Producer Betsy Carson [email protected] 604.251.0770

Executive Producer—French Market Lucie Tremblay [email protected] 514.281.1819

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  I, Fembot Treatment: Overview According to many of the scientists you are about to meet, we are entering a new phase of evolution.

Clockwise from top left: Propelled by the exponential advances being made in robot- Annalee Newitz, Tatsuya ics, Artificial Life and computational speed, many scientists Matsui, Cynthia Brazeal, David Levy, Anne Foerst believe we are at a point where it is nearly impossible to know where “natural” ends and “cultural” begins.

Roboticists seek to create social, emotional, embodied ”bots.” Yeah, just like us. That’s the idea, anyway. But now that all of this new technology presents us with a chance to really change things, will we use it to create a better world? And whose fantasies – whose nightmares – will we bring to life?

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  Is the robotics bullet train on a collision course with the horse and buggy of social evolution?

As robotics begins to bring science fiction to life, will social evolution keep pace? Or will these new technologies, these real-world marvels of creation, simply tell the same old sto- ries? The same old gender myths, the same old haves and have-nots, the same old double standards that we thought As robotics begins we had overcome? to bring science As we face our post-human future and all its questions and fiction to life, will challenges, a fembot phenomenon takes centre-stage. social evolution GAL 0101, Gendered Artificial Lifeform, is our animated keep pace? fembot narrator. “She” is “every-bot.” A time-traveler. A mys- tic. A teacher. A cartoon.

As she looks in on today from her futuristic vantage point, GAL has something very old-fashioned to teach us about gender, relationships – and the future. With GAL as our guide, we explore what makes us human (or humanoid) through the eyes of some very real characters.

Our Cast of Characters

ANNALEE NEWITZ, the sex and technology writer, takes on some serious questions about the impact of robotics on society, and especially on women. Having written on topics such as fembots, open source software and hacker subcultures for the likes of Wired and The New York Times, Newitz, at equal turns hilarious and disturbing, talks about what her robot utopia might look like.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  ANNE FOERST, a robot theologian, has radical notions on who deserves to be called a person and what a new human- ism – one that lets robots in – could mean. Committed to equality, even for robots, Foerst has mixed feelings about what fembots might represent.

CYNTHIA BREAZEAL, one of the world’s foremost scientists in the field of Artificial Life and one of the field’s few women in primary research, is a pioneer of social and She believes emotional robotics. She believes that some day robots will that some day be our friends. She’s not making fembots, but she might be robots will be making children, at least from a cognitive point of view. our friends. DAVID LEVY, whose recent book “Love + Sex with Robots” provides a catalyst to examine what fembots might want.

TATSUYA MATSUI, rogue designer, is concerned about the pervasive sexist approach to robotics. In response he has created “P-Noir,” the world’s first feminist robot.

The evolutionary psychologist DYLAN EVANS is interested in robot emotions – and he’s not afraid to show them. Evans believes in the genetic basis of gender difference, and so fears that the coming wave of fembots – and it is coming – will unleash stereotypical male behavior (that many men don’t want to admit they long for).

Soon, the fembot of their dreams will release all social mis- fits from loneliness.

Or will she?

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  Hot Science: Opening Sequence Nexi, the latest robot from Breazeal’s lab at MIT is talking to us. She explains that she is an “MDS” robot – mobile, dexterous, and social. Clockwise from top left: Fumio Hara We see a wonder-inspiring montage of today’s latest robots Labs, Leonardo, Asimo, MIT robot, and their creators. Some of these bots look so human they NEXI expressions. Centre: NEXI fool the eye. Others don’t look like people but are surprisingly expressive.

GAL: We’re going on a trip to see some interesting robots, primitive compared to what will be coming… but this is just the beginning, the starting point where science fiction comes to life.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  GAL introduces us to CYNTHIA BREAZEAL. Her robot “Kismet” is the bot that started it all. Kismet is no longer functioning and is in the MIT museum. Fembot scholar DAVID LEVY tells the story of the little girl who saw Kismet and was concerned when the robot was shut down. She said, “Cynthia will be sad, she’s Kismet’s mommy, and she’s going to miss her!”

We join BREAZEAL in the Media Lab at MIT. She’s with Leon- ardo, her huggable and furry “sociable robot” that is ca- Robots pable of emotional expression, vision, and “socially guided learning.” need to be BREAZEAL laughs about being a “Mommy” to her robots, nurtured, and explains how infant developmental and evolutionary like humans. psychology play a part in her work, from her time with her then instructor RODNEY BROOKS on his “insect bots” (Brooks is the former director of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab), to Kismet, and now to her newest robots.

A group of robot insects march into view.

RODNEY BROOKS explains how simple bots (like his insect- shaped bots) through interacting with their environments can cause complex behavior to emerge. Key to directing this emergent behavior, says Brooks, is to give the robot a clear “intention” that it seeks to fulfill.

BREAZEAL weighs in by stating her belief that, in order to be truly social, robots need to be – not just programmed – they need to be nurtured, like humans.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  ANNE FOERST worked with BREAZEAL on “Cog” (the star bot of MIT’s Human Robotics Group) and also on Kismet, and when she talks about these and other robots she sounds like she is reminiscing about old friends. For many in this film, as we will see, Kismet, especially, really is a deeply loved robot. Kismet, It is with Kismet that these “softer” values have crept into especially, the hard science of robotics as roboticists discover the is a deeply significance of the groundbreaking theory of “embodiment” loved robot. -– the idea that, like people, even a robot’s existence is shaped by its physical interaction with an environment and through responding to others.

The theory of embodiment has shifted the entire robotic paradigm. The other key areas that have revolutionized the development of humanoids are the emotional and the social.

GAL: It’s funny how this “embodiment” stuff was discovered by men, but it took a woman to take it to the next level. Sure, Mr. Brooks was amazed at how little brain it took to get bots to develop au- tonomous behavior, but BREAZEAL was more inter- ested in making sure those bots behaved!

Bodies and interaction affect the way both we and robots develop intelligence. The holy grail of embodied bots are the “humanoids.”

We rent an “actroid,” the cream of the crop of the human- oids, a female bot whose likeness to a female human is nothing short of stunning – and disturbing. We take her along on our robot journey.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  GAL: Something, isn’t she? She’s what you’d call the baby steps toward the evolution of truly autono- mous bots that can think and feel for themselves. Just like me! I don’t mean to freak you out, but the bots who evolve will have bodies, they will learn Suddenly, from their environments, and they will require Robosapien emotions for decision-making. As you would define it, they will be “social beings.” lunges at Leonardo, and We see that the actroid is not alone. our Actroid says She is watching the cute and cuddly Leonardo interact with a “Robosapien.” (Robosapien is a bang-em-up toy biomor- firmly, “Behave! phic robot produced by WowWee toys.) Leonardo seems amused, and responds to the sounds the Robosapien makes. Suddenly, Robosapien lunges at Leonardo, and our Actroid says firmly, “Behave!”

BREAZEAL, laughing, pulls the Robosapien away from Leon- ardo.

Staying with Leonardo, we cut to a demonstration of Leon- ardo taking the “Sally and Anne Test,” a developmental psy- chology test that measures social cognitive ability. Devel- oped to detect autism, the test is usually failed by children under age four.

Leonardo passes with flying colors.

GAL: Yes, your discovery that Artificial Intelligence is actually based on relationships will be impor- tant. It’s rooted in an understanding of “self” and “other.” You’ll have made a great leap then. But within the field of human-like robots, nature – let

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION  alone nurture – is still quite confused! And as far as our AI timeline is concerned, these bots may not be your servants – yet – but more baby steps have been taken because they are firmly integrated now as toys for your children – and of course, for your We’re in a bar. grown up boys. We pull back Cut to famous YouTube footage of Robosapien belching, farting and carrying on like your typical naughty lad. (When to see that you buy the toy, one of the modes you can select is “rude the bartender behaviour”). is a robot. Close-up of a martini being mixed. We’re in a bar. We pull back to see that the bartender is a robot. It’s a creation of the American roboticist David Calkin, and it really does mix a mean martini.

At the bar sits an actroid. The actroid picks up the drink.

ACTROID: Cheers.

BARTENDER: Chin-chin.

It is now revealed that on the stool next to the actroid sits GAL.

GAL: There’s this joke we AI have. A fembot walks into a bar… A guy walks up to her and offers to buy her a drink. “No thanks,” she says, “I don’t require liquids.” I guess you had to be there. She could tell him that she doesn’t generate any waste, either. Great for the environment but probably not the best pick-up line.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 10 The Humanoid Condition Text scrolls across the screen Star Wars style, with crackling film sound FX. An old- fashioned Voice-of-God narrator reads:

“Within a few decades, machine intelligence will surpass human intelligence, leading to The Singularity – tech- nological change so rapid and profound it represents a rupture in the fabric of human history. The implications include the merger of biological and non-biological intel- ligence, immortal software-based humans, and ultra-high levels of intelligence that expand outward in the universe at the speed of light.” – Raymond Kurzweil, 2001

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 11 Clips from the 1972 film “Future Shock” hosted by Orson Welles, with its futuristic Adam and Eve imagery.

ANNALEE NEWITZ points out how much Kurzweil’s dreams sound like the ones from Future Shock.

“Singularity peddlers like futurist Ray Kurzweil are always crowing about how we’re just about to seize control over our genomes and live forever,” says NEWITZ. “So far, we haven’t.”

With a creepy foreshadow, Newitz goes on to point out the danger of this fantasy of living forever by downloading the brain into a robotic body, speculating about which corpora- tion will own the hardware, and who might try to hack into your brain if you can’t afford the right upgrades.

Part of being human is knowing that we will die, says NEWITZ. So is facing ethical choices of how we are going to live.

Speaking of death…

Meet RODNEY BROOKS.

BROOKS jokes about how transhumanists like Kurzweil predict the timing of that moment when technology reach- es the point where their dreams of immortality might be realized. According to BROOKS, it’s usually around the time “they turn 70” – just as “their mortality clock is ticking the loudest.”

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 12 While optimistic about how far technology will go to re- engineer even evolution itself, Brooks is more willing than most in his field to admit there might be some “juice” that science just can’t explain or replicate. That could be why he, an avowed atheist, invited ANNE FOERST to MIT. She’s also a ANNE FOERST is a rare combination of computer scientist feminist who and theologian. At MIT she initiated the groundbreaking lecture series, “God and Computers,” and worked with both believes that RODNEY BROOKS and CYNTHIA BREAZEAL as they began to robots of the develop humanoid robots. future should For a theologian, FOERST has a disarmingly rational ap- be considered proach to religion, and a surprisingly emotional approach persons. to robots. She explains that the idea of embodiment isn’t just about having a body, but about understanding how the experience of being in the world, in a body, shaped who you are. Women have in the past been more defined as body than brain. FOERST believes that robots of the future should be considered persons. (Remember when women had to fight that battle? Not so long ago in evolutionary terms).

FOERST’s cutting edge work rewrites the old Cartesian mind/body split.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 13 Man, the Measure of All Bots

The old way of thinking about both mankind Clockwise from top left: and robots was to overcome the human limits Freidrich Nietzsche, of intelligence. To personify the ultimate pin- Ursula K. LeGuin, Leonardo’s

Vitruvian Man, Gundam nacle of masculine humanity: ultra rational,

Robot, Klaatu & Gort. disembodied, individual – the Nietzscheian Centre, Ursula K. Le Guin. superman.

Even now, FOERST notes, most people refer to robots as “he” unless they are very specifically female. She also won- ders if robots need genitals, let alone gender.

As the gender question of I, FEMBOT begins to swirl, we watch the legendary science fiction writerU rsula Le Guin, perform an autobiographical monologue, “I Am A Man”, about how she must be a man.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 14 Indeed, much of Le Guin’s fictional work deals with sex and gender in a speculative and utopic way, and often portrays relationships very differently from our fixation on the one- male/one-female couple as supreme.

Criticized in her early years by Isaac Asimov for being con- cerned too little with hard science, and too much with social The inventors of relationships, it actually turned out that LE GUIN became AI were a group hugely popular, and even somewhat prophetic in her concern of well-educated with the social and emotional side of science. nerds (all male) But are we headed towards the kind of gendertopia Le Guin who viewed ab- is describing? stract reasoning, And is social evolution anywhere near even the optimistic and pleasurable sexual fantasies LE GUIN describes? math and chess as the pinnacle On the “likely not” side, FOERST points out that the inventors of AI were a specific group of well-educated nerds (all male) of human ac- who viewed abstract reasoning, math and chess as the pin- complishment. nacle of human accomplishment.

FOERST goes on to paint a picture of how people and robots can and should interact, and whether, at some point, the hu- man community might confer “personhood” on robots.

Over a montage of 1950’s Wonder-bread ads where rosy- cheeked children and mothers make sandwiches, inter- spersed with a housewife robot from that same era, FOERST points out that even today there is still no humanoid robot that can put butter on a slice of bread.

Says FOERST: “A lot of what is considered ‘simple’ women’s labour is extremely complex behavior to program.”

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 15 RAYMOND KURZWEIL’s take on gender is to host his website with an virtual AI named Ramona, who he claims is his alter ego.

We visit KURZWEIL on the set of his upcoming movie that he’s writing and producing – about himself and set in the future – KURZWEIL plays himself in the future (since he plans to be there). An actress plays Ramona, who is also KURZWEIL as a woman, in the future. Says KURZWEIL: “Wom- en are more interesting than men, and if it’s more interest- ing to be with a woman, it is probably more interesting to be a woman.”

It might be more interesting to watch Raymond play a woman in the past.

FOERST also explores the gender difference within AI, and specifically within work around cognition, pointing out that while the differences between men and women may be socially constructed, those differences are very strong, and that “when there are more women working in the robotics field, there will be a difference in what is pursued and cre- ated in research.”

This tension between the polar opposites of “rational man” and “emotional woman” is being undone if BROOKS and BREAZEAL’s approach to embodied and situated robots is to be taken at expressive face value.

But then there are embodied robots that seem to have no brains at all…

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 16 WowWee! Brand-new toy robots tell the same old gender story.

Boxed illustrations: Cut to singing, dancing “Femisapiens.” The song? “I’m a ro- Femisapiens and Robo- bot girl, in a robot world...” sapiens in party mode A few years ago, WOWWEE toys came out with the first from Youtube videos. truly affordable home robot. The Robosapien retailed for Centre: Robosapien. about a hundred bucks. (Of course, it’s made in China!) Like BROOKS’ early insect-bots, the technology is based on the idea of very simple components and the emergence of more complex behaviour. (Or not, if you view the viral video of Robosapien drinking, dancing, farting, belching and picking up girls as examples of ‘primitive’ programming!) Yes, he’s definitely gendered male.

Says a WOWWEE TOYS representative: “Robots have a bad rap. They’re either evil creatures in movies or something you

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 17 blow up in video games. We’re hoping the Robosapiens will change that attitude and pave the way for larger robots.”

And now, WowWee toys is bringing out a companion for the macho Robosapien – she’s a Femisapien who can dance, emote, and give you a kiss. In Japan, the electronics giant Sega is releasing the same toy as “Ema.” Levy is We will shoot our own footage of Robo and Femi on the convinced that perfect “date.” the coming sex- Is this little doll the innocent toy harbinger of the sexbots bot revolution that are coming soon? Perhaps. She’s already being billed as will be the cure the “perfect girlfriend.” to loneliness. Meet DAVID LEVY. In his much written-about book, “Love and Sex with Ro- bots,” Levy predicts it will be only 20 years until we are marrying robots, and a few years less until we are having sex with them.

SHERRY TURKLE is an MIT professor and the first person to really discuss the psychological implications of the growing human interaction with computers. She inspired Levy with her description of a computer-science student, ”Anthony.”

Anthony says: “I’ve tried having girlfriends but I prefer my relationship with my computer.”

Is this stereotype of the anti-social “nerd” still true, or has geek chic managed to replace the stigma? What is true is that the numbers of women in science have pretty much caught up with men. Except in computer science, engineer- ing and robotics.

While considered outlandish by many, LEVY is convinced that the coming sexbot revolution will be the cure to lone-

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 18 liness. He believes in gender equity, too – there will be fembots and malebots and anything else we like in order to meet all our individual preferences. When questioned on camera as to whether female fantasies revolve around sex with objects or whether they have a vision of re-program- ming live men, LEVY doesn’t have an answer. Robots cannot And while LEVY is happily married and admittedly a little old choose you, for fembot frolicking, he does say on camera that he doesn’t they cannot think sex with a robot would be cheating on his wife. reject you. GAL introduces us to author MARGE PIERCY. In her novel “He, She and It”, she took on woman/manbot love through the forbidden affair between her female protagonist and the cyborg “Yod.”

MARGE PIERCY describes reading Donna Haraway’s Cyborg Manifesto and being inspired by it. In her story the male cy- borg Yod is fighting against his own programming as a killer – a metaphor for the social programming of mainstream masculinity.

Evolutionary psychologist, roboticist and expert on emo- tions, DYLAN EVANS has concerns about Levy’s wifebots, pointing out the paradox of robot-love he says: “What is absolutely crucial to the sentiment of love is the belief that the love is neither unconditional nor eternal. Robots can- not choose you, they cannot reject you. That could become very boring, and one can imagine the human becoming cruel against his defenseless partner.”

Meanwhile, the sexbots that can carry on a conversation, let alone walk on their own, are not here yet. What about the real fembots? Well, they certainly have a fictionallegacy.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 19 The Phembot Phenom GAL: Recently we’ve seen fembots in ads

Clockwise from top left: for beer, razors, and vodka, and they are a

Philishave ad, The Stepford mainstay in movies and SciFi TV series.

Wives 1975, Robot girl- We see a montage of the images she describes. friend from Fry’s ad, Maria from Metropolis, Beyonce Cut to ANNALEE NEWITZ, martini in hand. in Maria costume, Lind- After a wild night in San Francisco’s robot underground, we say Wagner as The Bionic follow NEWITZ to WisCon, a notoriously lively feminist sci- Woman, fembots with Aus- ence fiction conference where spontaneous performances tin Powers. Centre: Cylons are known to erupt. With some other sci-fi aficionados, the from Battlestar Galactica. topic of girl-manga leads us to Annalee’s thoughts on the renaissance of fembots in popular culture.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 20 Over a media montage – including pop superstar Beyonce appearing as Maria from Fritz Lang’s “Metropolis” at the BET Awards (Black Entertainment Television) – Newitz describes what she calls the “Fembot Mystique” as the quintessential male fantasy – merging sex, technology, and a paradoxical mixture of subservience and dominance.

NEWITZ regales us with her critique of the Bionic Woman remake and why she is not sorry it flopped. She compares it with the ever-popular Battlestar Galactica remake (now in its one-thousandth season) which is a much more complex fembot fantasia, but – sigh – with Cylons who still look like supermodels. (In fact, two of the Cylons – Canadian actors Tricia Helfer and Grace Park – started out as models.)

On the subject of popular sci-fi, NEWITZ pulls the Canadian actor Tricia Helfer numbers card: “Compare the females you SEE,” she says, plays Cylon Number Six in

Battlestar Galactica. “with the number of women that TELL the mainstream sci-fi stories in movies and on television.”

So where are we with the development of real fembots? Very recently it’s started to look like they are coming to life.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 21 It’s Alive! It’s Alive! Japanese roboticist HIROSHI ISHIGURO of Osa-

Clockwise from top left: ka University has created some of the world’s

Sanrio Actroid, Repliee Q1 most realistic looking humanoid robots – the Expo and creator Hiroshi Repliees. (As well as a “geminoid,” which is a Ishiguro, Actroid, Aiko male and essentially a version of ISHIGURO without wig, Aiko, and Ac- himself). troid. Centre: Repliee Q2 These bots are based on real people and most of them are female. The Repliees have inspired the consumer series of Actroids (made by Sanrio, the company that makes the global pop phenomenon Hello Kitty). The Actroids host tradeshows and act as receptionists. Ishiguro’s robots are not sexbots – they’re just, well, kinda’ hot.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 22 ISHIGURO has made it clear he does not want to be associ- ated with LEVY and his sexbots. It does seem hard to avoid, though. If you google Repliee you cannot help but find yourself amongst the porn sites for such temptresses as the Real Doll, who look a lot like ISHIGURU’s creation – just sluttier and (literally) cheaper. The Repliees also rely on a As he similar skin technology to the porn dolls in order to appear demonstrates as realistic as they do. how Aiko Much of Ishiguro’s research delves into how far he can go feels pain, before his robots creep people out. In scientific terms, this the footage is known as the “uncanny valley” – going from the standard becomes more “Wow” or “Cool” remarks about life-like robots, to hitting the point that they look so real it truly disturbs us. disturbing. But science has reached the point where computer scien- tists can create fembots in their own basements. Meet a homegrown basement-bot – she lives in Brampton, Ontario – her name is Aiko.

We see a young Asian woman in a wheelchair with a ban- daged hand.

We are at the Ontario Science Museum where a young man is demonstrating what he claims is Canada’s first android. This software engineer from Brampton, Ontario, invented Aiko in his basement. Today he proudly demonstrates what she can do. But as he demonstrates how Aiko feels pain, the footage becomes more disturbing. “Ow, why you do that for? I do not want to do this anymore,” Aiko protests. In the end, the young man leans over and squeezes Aiko’s breast. She hits away his hand, saying, “I do not like it when you touch my breasts.”

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 23 What exactly is going on here? Aiko is not exactly a sexbot – but what is she?

A little research uncovers not only the Project Aiko web- site, but the fact that her measurements are indicated in the hopes that people will send clothes. As well, she has a Myspace page, a horoscope, and is listed as 18 (even though she was created in 2007). Her creator, Li Trung, wants his science to be taken seriously, yet he remains oblivious to how people will respond to his fembot. His own tags for his blog read: “Aiko, Android, Robot, Human, Lady, Female, Robotics, human-like, sexy, idol, technology.” Aiko,”Canada’s first handi- No wonder the blog Engadget referred to this bot as “Cana- capped, sexually harassed da’s first handicapped, sexually harassed fembot.” fembot.” – Engadget We visit Aiko, and her human, in their home to find out more about their bizarre relationship.

Do Aiko and her fembot kin represent a sign of the ”singu- larity” to come? Or is she a throwback – a cleaned-up, high- tech cave-woman suitable for a Geiko ad?

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 24 “Fembotics”

At Perfect-Woman.com, it appears you can

Clockwise from top left: order yourself a fembot to your preferred Aiko and creator, still from specifications. But is it all what it seems? Perfect Woman site, fembot We see a montage of imagery from the infamous Fry’s prop from Austin Pow- electronics ad, 50s’ product ads, Stepford Wives, ending ers film, still from Perfect

Woman site on many images from perfect-woman.com including their video demonstration of the perfect wife that is apparently for sale.

GAL: You know these sexy fembots are everywhere. But there seems to be a kind nostalgia for the fu- turism of the past in all these ads as well as a high tech dominatrix-style sexualization of the female machine. (GAL cracks her power cord whip.)

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 25 More (rather unbelievable) footage of “Lisa” the “Perfect- woman.”

GAL: You do know this is a hoax, right? There is no perfect woman/fembot, just a very clever ad for Phillips shavers.

Now here’s something that’s not so funny.

“Fembot” is now being used as a new slur against women, especially women who don’t breed, as well as those who question their old-fashioned roles as “god or nature given. “It’s the new “Feminazi.” We see a clip from the Today Show (from Oct 5, 2007) where this accusation against “fembots” is being made. In a case of “damned if you do, damned if you don’t,” ‘fembot’ refers both to an over sexualized, aug- mented woman and to an uppity feminist.

GAL: I found a funny little thing on line – it’s game of fembot bingo. It’s where men goad feminists and predict what they will say. Hilarious. One of them has also written the “Four Laws of Fembotics”:

“It is essential that your fembot be equipped with the Four Laws of Fembotics. Failure to include these laws may be di- sastrous, as this would essentially permit free will, and we all know that anything that is free can’t be any good.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 26 1. A fembot may not injure a human being or, through in- action, allow a human being to come to harm.

2. A fembot must obey orders given her by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

3. A fembot must protect her own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Sec- ond Law.

4. A fembot is not smart enough to remember more than two laws at a time.”

GAL: Looks like it might be time to reclaim the word.

Daniel Wilson – author of “How To Survive A Robot Upris- ing” – warns us that the fembots are the most dangerous of all, having the power to seduce their enemies.

In case it all goes terribly wrong, South Korea, Japan and the European Robotics Research Network (EURON) are draft- ing ethical guidelines for human/robot relations.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 27 Robots Are People Too So... Are the sexbots really, ahem, coming?

We return to the robotics theologian, ANNE FOERST, this time amongst her students at Bonaventure University, Clockwise from top left: where they are experimenting with their new “People-bot,” fembots from Bjork video studying how humans interact based on their perception of All Is Made Of Love, on-off the robot’s gender. switch, Hajime Sorayama illustration, Aiko, hotel It’s not a stretch to imagine people having sex with robots. room fembot, Aiko. Centre: But no matter how convincingly they can offer to us the ful- image from Ghost In The fillment of our every desire, how can we ever know if they

Shell: Innocence. are deriving pleasure from us?

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 28 Says FOERST: “The idea of a sexual robot per se is nothing I think out of our experience. But if it comes to the question, ‘Can the robot decide and say no? Can the robot actually have a right to sexual expression?’ And therefore can the robot actually stand up and say ‘I want to sleep with him, but not with you’. That’s very, very scary.”

Why would you In FOERST’s view, using fembots for sex – unless we are willing to grant them sexual rights of their own – limits hu- spend a small man potential for the community and connection that she fortune on a sex hopes robots can teach us. toy that could DYLAN EVANS jokes about freebots and fembots and says turn herself off? that there is the chance that your fembot might go into per- manent unresponsive mode if you don’t treat her right. And why, one wonders, would you spend a small fortune on a sex toy that could turn herself off?

As we do seem to be on a path to creating more and more humanlike robots, this will be the question in the future: How far are we willing to go to give robots rights? Because otherwise, they remain only products – or slaves.

DAVID LEVY views the ethical issues around robots and con- sent seriously. He thinks it is possible to rape a fembot, and agrees that when we reach the point when robots could be given rights similar to humans this will be an issue to be faced. In the meantime, his view is that of a benevolent patriarch. “We shouldn’t mistreat our robots as that will set a bad example for children,” he says. (He also doesn’t think robots should be allowed to have money.)

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 29 ANNE FOERST points out that this policing of who gets to be defined as human or as a “person” has been, historically, a focal point of the struggle for equality and against racism. But this struggle for gender equality has been part of the critique of humanism, too.

Says NEWITZ: “Once we have autonomous [fembots] that can think for themselves, they’ll revolt, they’ll rise up, they’ll become feminists. If you’re lucky, they’ll start some feminist journals. If you’re unlucky, they’re going to kill you.”

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 30 Thank Heaven for Little Girlbots Thank heaven for little girl-bots – they grow up in the most delightful ways...

Clockwise from top left: We head to Osaka, Japan.

P-noir, NEXI with blue eyes, We take our rented Actroid to meet a very different kind of angry NEXI, P-noir, Posy fembot. with flowers, Posy.

Centre: Posy. Tall and lanky with a jet-black mane, P-Noir’s creator, TATSUYA MATSUI, of Flower Robotics, looks like a movie star – but it’s his humanoid robot prototypes that have become the celebs. Flower Robotics’ first creation, “Posy,” debuted in Sofia Coppola’s 2003 filmLost in Translation. MATSUI passionately opposes the idea that robots are for war or slavery and describes his robots “as exhibiting a vast and complex range of emotions that we feel are lack- ing, or at least overlooked, in robot culture, particularly in

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 31 regard to women.” He is also opposed to militaristic ele- ments of the robotics industry, and even the idea that they should be consumer-driven.

So somewhat iconoclastically, for a Japanese man, MATSUI created what he calls a “feminist” robot called “P-Noir.” In Ja- pan the idea of a “feminist” robot is provocative, as indeed it is anywhere these days. This issue of MATSUI is rethinking the very role and purpose of robots. representation We discuss with him the problems of representing women and of pornog- “realistically” as robots. For as soon as the female robot raphy is often looks human, we sexualize her. the “elephant in BREAZEAL and FOERST weigh in on the dangers and difficul- the room.” ties of representing the female without her instantly being objectified and seen as sexual in a way that men, and ro- bots, are not. The even darker undercurrent that we explore (but by no means resolve) is the old marriage between sex and violence. Is objectification to blame? How does any kind of representation of women deal with this?

GAL: Ah, human females. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. Never really figured that one out, did you?

As our social historian of science, SALLY WYATT says that this issue of representation and of pornography is often the “elephant in the room” that doesn’t get talked about any more. And those who fund robotics often are the military and entertainment (particularly pornography) industries. The point she is making is that science never exists entirely separate from the social and historical world it is part of.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 32 We see promotional footage of a Samsung-produced sentry as it rattles off machine gun fire at human-shaped targets with dynamic, inspirational music blaring in the back- ground. The promotional footage ends with the gleaming Samsung logo.

We intercut this with boys playing video games (and very few girls). Femisapien footage (created by WowWee) has the bots singing and dancing – the song is a parody of the hit, “Barbie Girl,” by one-hit wonder Aqua. The lyrics go some- thing like this:

I’m a robot girl, in a robot world Made of plastic, I’m not spastic If you touch me there, I’ll kick you, you-know-where Femisapien: the perfect Kind of frisky, better not touch my booty girlfriend. There’s no escapin’, Femisapien!

So, are we post-human yet?

We certainly aren’t post-gender.

FOERST muses on the persistence of gender, which in her view is shaped more by culture than by genes, but which she readily admits is a very powerful force. If we are going to have robots in the future with gender, FOERST doesn’t believe they should all be male, but she thinks that creating fembots will lead us to some very dangerous territory if we don’t think very carefully about what we are doing.

According to GEORGE DVORSKY, a Canadian agenda-driven futurist and transhumanist, “We can no longer deny that males and females are profoundly different. The hallucina- tion is over. Scientists and behaviorists are discovering that

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 33 men and women differ not just physically, but cognitively and emotionally. These differences are not merely the result of gender-specific socialization; they are innate – the result of thousands of years of sexual competition and selection.”

But fear not – DVORSKY believes gender is a disease we now have the power to overcome – just like mortality. We’ll Dvorsky find out what kind of drugs he recommends! believes gender ANNE FOERST is fascinated by evolutionary theory and how is a disease it is being used to develop artificial life within evolutionary robotics. She’s also critical of the genetic determinism that we now have can creep in. “There is data,” says FOERST, “and then there the power to is interpretation of that data based on the interests of the overcome. one doing the interpreting.”

The debates within the field of evolutionary psychology boil down, to some degree, to debtates over what is “intrin- sic” and therefore often inevitable versus what is learned and therefore able to be changed by social evolution. For those interested in politcal or social change this comes down to choices about what we should do next, and how much choice we have left. For far too often, those who ar- gue for a more deterministic take on our genes and gender apply those ideas to a similarly deterministic political view- point.

SALLY WYATT points to recent studies that show that wom- en have reached close to gender parity in all the sciences except Computer Science, Engineering and Robotics – and that woman and children are still the poorest of the poor worldwide.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 34 Only this year, unable to ignore its prevalence as a deliber- ate strategic tactic used by the military, the UN declared, and condemned, rape as a weapon of war.

Women have made progress but don’t have pay equity. Men who do work that once was considered “female” are also The Transhu- economically penalized since these are low, or non-paying manists – all jobs. It comes down to a system that values certain work male – want over others. Women are made to feel that their most impor- to live forever; tant asset is the way they look, and men are told they are “high status” when they earn a lot of money. This economic women just system values production and innovation over maintenance want to look and sustainability. It has had an impact on ol’ “Mother young forever. Earth” as well. GAL: The Transhumanists – all male – want to live forever; women just want to look young forever. Man oh man, did I really evolve from all of you? What’s at stake here is social justice. You can’t keep saying “biology made me do it” or you will evolve yourselves out of existence. It’s enough to give a fembot like me an identity crisis. To become “post- humane” – that’s far worse than being post-human, if you ask me!

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 35 The Rapture of the Nerds vs. The Rise of the Cyborg Humanist

Science Fiction has an ongoing theme of robots rising up and running amok. Given Clockwise from top left: human history, it’s pretty clear that human Chromehound, Termina- beings are the greatest threat to sentient tor I, Kurzweil’s daily pill robots, the future robot-rights movement, intake, Terminator III, Pris and ourselves. from Blade Runner. Centre: Image from Ghost In The According to NEWITZ, “Anxiety about the machines rising Shell: Innocence. up to kill us is part of our guilt as a society over how we treat each other.”

While KURZWEIL and his fellow futurists invest in cryogen- ics and wrangle their vitamins so they will meet the day of singularity with enough of a body left to jack into the future – what about the rest of us?

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 36 Most of the robotics community (and our subjects are no exception) like the biotech industry before them, are busy trying to increase the public’s comfort level and acceptance of robots in our midst. And now that we are arguably in the thrall of our devices (computers, iPods, cell phones) it does seem that they are winning the PR war.

BILL JOY, CO-FOUNDER OF Sun Microsystems, is no Luddite. “What used to But according to him: “Our most powerful 21st-century take a million technologies — robotics, genetic engineering and nanotech- years of evolu- nology — are threatening to make humans an endangered species. What used to take a million years of evolution will tion will take take eight hours in the future.” eight hours in JOY, and others like ALLAN MACKWORTH, a past president the future.” of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelli- gence, say that the time to discuss these things outside the ivory tower of science is now.

Newitz says: “We have to get over our own programming before we can write a new program that is going to be ethi- cal and able to deal with life in a future world.”

Or are we just, um, doomed?

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 37 Rise Up and Re-program An army of Robosapiens is encroaching upon a gaggle of the MP3 Barbie Bots. Clockwise from top left: We create a scenario where they have an American Museum of Natu- ral History Akeley African unmediated robotic encounter.

Hall – Great Apes diorama, Over this is heard the V/O of ANNALEE NEWITZ describing telescope girl, Kismet at how most of her friends engaged in “Barbie modification” the MIT museum, MIT ro- as girls. Her favorite was replacing Barbie’s legs with di- botic flowers, Greenhouse nosaur legs. Within this section, we also see a Robosapien interior from The Eden being held in the arms of P-Noir, almost as if it were a child. Project. In slow motion, P-Noir dances with the bot.

We cut to footage of the diorama of the Akeley African Hall of great apes in the Museum of Natural History in NYC.

GAL: Gotta love evolution. Check out your ances- tors. You know, the man who invented the movie camera also invented modern taxidermy. Those

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 38 apes are his handiwork. He had a vision of the per- fect alpha male and his family, but he didn’t find it in the wild. He created this diorama by killing more apes than he needed, and only preserved the ones that fit his image of the perfect nuclear family. These are the stuffed apes in Akeley African Hall.

From one museum to another.

We cut to CYNTHIA BREAZEAL in front of the glass case that houses the now-inactive Kismet in the MIT museum. BREAZEAL looks a little wistful as she describes the day Kismet was “shut down.”

NEWITZ describes her version of an urban-green utopia, populated by some lightly enhanced humans and many art-bots. For her, the enemy is not technology, but capitalist monsters, and it’s clear she thinks the transhumanists are Kismet behind glass at the

MIT museum. among them.

DYLAN EVANS explains his Utopia experiment in Scotland, which proved to him that we need to come to terms with both our need and desire for technology, and how we will sustain the addiction with a planet whose resources are stretched thin.

BREAZEAL is clear that we have a responsibility to society for what we create. The woman that has been described as a modern-day Mary Shelley sees a world where Franken- stein does not build a monster, but a friend. While FOERST’s view of human nature is that we are story-tellers, with sci- ence merely one of the stories we tell.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 39 FOERST gives a compelling account of how we feel alien- ated and desire connection, and that we have a tendency to want to justify our behaviour. The ways in which we negoti- ate these ”instincts” lead to the ways in which we develop our societies, and also how we defend them. Her theology is more pragmatic than dogmatic – we don’t have a soul, Both are driven she says, we participate in one. If we deny the sentient by a curiosity to robots of the future status as persons, all the excuses we make reflect how we continue to devalue and alienate oth- understand how ers who are the humans already among us. the robots, or Both BREAZEAL and FOERST are driven by a curiosity to un- cyborgs, of the derstand how the robots, or cyborgs, of the future will feel. future will feel. They are committed to embodiment as a form of knowing, not merely the idea of using the robot for our own pleasure or as a glorified appliance.

And FOERST thinks that improving communication between people, let alone finding actual community, might make us feel better than what it sometimes seems we are on our way to doing – replacing relationships with people with relationships with robots.

As for us – humans today – perhaps we should learn from Kismet and go back to robokindergarten so we can learn to play nice in the sandbox that is left of our planet. And share the wonder of that little girl over there in the corner of the playground – the one with the telescope.

I, Fembot • TREATMENT • August 25, 2008 • 2008 BIG PICTURE MEDIA CORPORATION 40