Keywords

FormalPara Interviewees

  • Malak Al Akiely

  • Georgie Benardete

  • Silvia Console Battilana

  • Carola Ferstl

  • Rossana Figuera

  • Sadiq Gillani

  • Rebeca Hwang

  • Lily Lapenna

  • Pia Mancini

  • Kate Roberts

In the future, we will have sex with whoever we want, at any time or place that we want, at any age that we want—Ray Kurzweil

Ask your partner in bed “how do you want me to make you feel?,” and not “what do you want me to do?” This year’s Valentine’s Day seemed like any other; those in coming years might be wildly different.

In 2017, the sex tech industry was valued to be a 30 billion US dollar industry with a growing rate of 30% per year. (Goczynska-Han, 2020). Talking about sex has still many taboos in most cultures. Technology can make sex more approachable and easier to talk about with people who matter the most.

Women are stepping into this male-dominated business sector, which will be transformative. We are likely at the dawn of a new sexual revolution. Currently, the sex tech business is like the Wild West, with no rules and very little ethical considerations, e.g., having sex with a robot takes away consent from the act. But this will certainly change as we move into the future.

A report on the Future of Sex classifies different branches of the sex tech industry. These are (i) remote sex; (ii) robots; (iii) immersive entertainment; (iv) virtual sex; and (v) augmentation (Owsianik & Dawson, 2022).

In her TEDx talk “The Future of Sex”, Bryony Cole shared her perspective on the future of sex and technology. In the virtual space, you will be able to go on a date on Mars, swap bodies, and have sex exploring different identities. This will question our traditional preferences and our humanity will be looked at through different prisms over time (TEDxTalks, 2019).

A 2020 survey found that more and more people, would have sex with a robot (Nguyen, 2020). Will we consider it cheating, having sex with robots? According to forecasts, in the next 30 years, one in ten people will have had sex with a robot.

Gender-neutral perspectives are emerging in the real world, further facilitated by the virtual world. Haptic, multisensory experiences are set to revolutionize virtual sex. As a result, “peculiarities of vaginomics” may become a technological field of research.

In the virtual realm, porn is the obvious driver of innovation, which is not always without negative consequences, e.g., deep-fake porn where faces can be swapped to portray anyone (including politicians or celebrities) performing a sex act and published online. Nevertheless, the development of virtual spaces and technology allows other areas to emerge. Virtual sexology promises to make you a better lover; sex education will be able to create an immersive private environment where one can fully explore sexuality, or sex education programs will teach boys and girls about consent.

The need to limit travel and to introduce lockdowns amidst the pandemic impacted our sexual lives like nothing before. Many had no physical contacts with their partners for months, and as a consequence, we had to adapt. As work and shopping increasingly turned to virtual solutions, so did sex. Sexting saw a rise as did the sale of sex toys (Dubé et al., 2020). According to the Future of Sex report, more than 25% of young people will have had a long-distance sexual experience (Owsianik & Dawson, 2022).

1 Love and Sex with Robots

The popular American HBO show Westworld depicted inhumane violence that humans can inflict on robotic companions. Robots are machines intended to make human lives better, but some fear they will steal our jobs and our hearts. Male robots are called androids, whereas female robots are gynoids. In Westworld, advances in the field are taking them into the more complex domains of sex, emotions, and love.

Humans will fall in love with robots, humans will marry robots, and humans will have sex with robots, all as (what will be regarded as) ‘normal’ extensions of our feelings of love and sexual desire for other humans (Levy, 2007).

One in ten young adults will have had sex with a humanoid robot by 2050. Adult performers and some B-list celebrities will sell robotic replicas of themselves designed for sex by 2033. Sci-fi sex fantasies will spring to life as people can enhance their biology and merge with machines.

Erogenous zones and orgasms are simply the product of chemicals firing in the brain. If scientists can replicate that feeling by firing signals from an implanted chip or a brain wave headset, then it might even be the end of sex altogether (Istvan, 2014)

In the far-off future, technology could develop that directly stimulates the brain. Orgasms could be produced instantaneously. Nevertheless, this is nothing new, and we do need self-regulation to control our desire to get satisfied and pleasured (Williams, 2019). In an experiment from 1958, John C. Lilly generated a sixteen-hour orgasm! Science is science, and scientists are curious by nature, so Lilly decided to explore the “infinite meanings,” possible addictiveness, and capability of the body for orgasm through his experiments: he built a little box with a button (remote control), so that the monkey, by pressing the button, had a complete orgasm induced by a fine wire electrode into the brain. But the system was programmed so that the monkey could press the button once every 3 minutes only, meaning that the monkey had to wait 3 minutes to get another orgasm. Guess what happened? The monkey pressed the control button every 3 minutes for 16 consecutive hours and then fell asleep. After about 8 hours of sleep, the monkey again pressed the button for 16 consecutive hours and then went back to sleep for another 8 hours. The team had to stop the experiment because the monkey had lost its memory. He just wanted to push that button and had forgotten to eat, drink, etc., for many days. Direct stimulation without control mechanisms can also cause harm for a human (Williams, 2019).

According to UK futurists, in 2050, sexual contact between a person and an electronic device or a robot will occur more frequently than between two people. Futurologist Ian Pearson (2016a) predicts the spread of sex toys interacting with augmented and virtual reality. New technologies will bring an intimate relationship with robots to such a level that they will not differ from interpersonal contact.

Pearson believes that there will be a best of both worlds. Human and emotional relationships will continue, but they will be separated from sex or else made better and safer by the use of technology. You could download your favorite star avatar during physical sex, getting the security, affection, and hopefully love of being with a real partner, along with the option to indulge your wildest fantasies.

Pearson predicts that many people will still have their reservations about sex with robots at first but gradually get used to them. The mechanical behavior and their feel will improve, as they start to develop strong emotional bonds, and any squeamishness will gradually go away. As well as enhancing appearances, virtual reality (VR) will help those who feel unfulfilled to explore their sexual fantasies and to unleash their imagination, alone or with their partner.

Night clubs will soon be using robotic dancers. The robots will be pricey, especially if it features humanlike soft materials and is able to imitate human moves. The robots even come with a customizable personality and only the emotional baggage you want. A perfect solution for people who want sex with no strings attached that excludes emotional feelings and commitment.

There is also a prediction for robot fetish or the sexual desire for statues or mannequins. But can you fall in love with a robot? Can the robots fall in love with you?

2 Dream Sex

Another feature of the future VR headset is that it can be replaced by active contact lenses. Tiny lasers or LEDs will allow written images directly onto the retina. Ultrahigh-definition display overlaying will replace whatever or whoever you are looking at. Controlling this could be through one’s thoughts, eyebrow muscles, or simply blinking.

Can you keep the contact lenses on while sleeping? The contact lenses would lie under your eyelids, so you could still see images with your eyes closed. While sleeping, they could be linked to a computer that detects when you are in a dream state and what images you are seeing and then injects images or video to enhance your dream. Go one step further and link your dreams to others dreaming at the same time.

Our world will soon have virtual reality technology, dream sex, and directly stimulate orgasms by the touch of an icon or instant message. Apparently, this will make sex easier, safer, more frequent, and more fun. Pearson (2016b) predicts that by 2030, most people will have some form of virtual sex.

There will still be various innovative porn subscriptions and the pay-as-you-go webcam sites that we already have, but virtual reality will create lucrative 3D opportunities that offer lots more fun and feeling or personal involvement. Use a 3D immersive environment to interact with graphics and environment customized to your preferences, with a variety of gadgets providing the physical sensations.

VR offers to combine the best of imagination and reality. You can even use avatars as well as real people to fulfill fantasies. It will need tools to adjust appearance and behavior and a range of devices to connect bodies to information technology for the sex experience. VR contact lenses will allow you to see a different person than the one you are having sex with, such as a celebrity, and you can even instantly change their face or costume. Of course, this would require proper regulation in order not to spiral out of control, similar to Lilly's experimental monkey hitting the button.

According to predictions published by the 2050 Earth Project, sex toys will continue to play an important role in enhancing and exploring people’s sexuality, even with the rise of digital dating and a more distant world. Physical touch and the desire for it will still be crucial in sexual experiences, both alone and with a partner. While tools such as specialized gloves, helmets, and glasses can help create a virtual erotic experience, human contact cannot be fully replaced by toys or robots. And new ethical questions will emerge as the technologies evolve.

3 A New Reproductive Revolution

The article by Brandon Ambrosino (2019) for BBC Future explores the possibility of a new sexual revolution where more people will choose to conceive in a lab through in vitro fertilization (IVF). Greely (2018), the author of “The End of Sex And The Future of Human Reproduction,” predicts that in the future, people will still have sex but not as often for the purpose of making babies. The article also notes that the purpose of sex only for procreation has its roots in ancient times, but pleaesure is the main reason why most people have sex. The article references a quote from a 1968 Readers Digest article that suggested the birth control pill could have a more significant impact on society than the nuclear bomb.

Many scientists claim that population rates peaked already and are in decline, to reach 0% growth rate by 2100 Roser et al., 2013. Concurrently, trials are already underway with male contraceptives that do not suppress a man’s libido or affect his weight or health, like women have had to endure for decades.

How will gossip look when lab-made men in a holographic bar try to discuss their sex partners while enjoying a glass of genetically modified beer? Will they gossip about new retroviruses that can survive on silicone?

According to Ambrosino (2019), longer life expectancies are challenging traditional notions of monogamy and commitment. With people living longer, the idea of having one sexual partner for life becomes harder to achieve. Divorce and remarriage rates are already on the rise, and some futurists predict that life expectancy will continue to increase significantly. Therefore, the traditional commitment “till death do us part” may no longer be a realistic goal for many people.

Alexis Madrigal has written in The Atlantic that these days, women only have a very general sense of when in their lives they’ll stop being fertile, but in the future, women will have more “personalized” biological clocks, so they’ll know exactly when they’ll stop being able to make babies. Couples of the future will also have a better idea of when they should try to conceive. Personal hormone trackers that detect bodily changes through the skin could become a normal part of tracking our fertility (Madrigal, 2014).

Researchers are exploring genetic engineering as a way to cure sick children by removing or replacing genes. In the future, technologies such as CRISPR may also be used to enhance children by correcting issues such as crooked teeth or poor eyesight, potentially even improving IQ (Big Think, 2011). These advances raise unprecedented moral, philosophical, and regulatory implications. For example, if genetic modifications are done on the germline, they will be inherited and passed down through future generations, raising dystopian fears of re-engineering the human species and opening the door to misuse. But without a doubt, gene editing will revolutionise the prevention and treatment of diseases and conditions including cancer, as long we ensure global access and democratization—or will only the rich be able to afford it? How will gossip look when lab-made men in a holographic bar try to discuss their sex partners while enjoying a glass of genetically modified beer? Will they gossip about new retroviruses that can survive on silicone?

4 Shifting Gender Roles

A study by Oxford University has shown that as more women join the workforce, household dynamics will continue to change. The study predicts that by 2050, men and women in many developed countries will share childcare and household chores.

The future may bring a crisis of masculinity as robots replace men, mainly affecting blue-collar male workers. While it is not easy being a woman, it may be increasingly challenging being a man. In the United States, for instance, a record number of more than 100,000 people died last year of drug overdose of which 70% were men. In China, authorities are worried about a “masculinity crisis” as Chinese boys are becoming ‘less masculine’, and they are trying to strengthen the “yang spirit” in order to balance the more feminine yin force in Taoism.

The Japanese media often write about “fasting men,” where 43% of unmarried Japanese between 18 and 34 are still virgins. A related phenomenon is the misogynistic “incel” movement in the United States and Canada of men who label themselves as “involuntary celibates.” They often turn radical, blame women for their lack of access to sex, and spread conspiracy theories.

But as technology advances, a face or costume can be customized and changed at an instance. Therefore, you might sometimes experience one gender and sometimes another, including while performing sex. Will people become accustomed to gender experimentation, making sexuality more fluid?

With sex now influenced by engineering and imagination, new categories could also be created, including new kinds of genitalia, gender roles, and behaviors. Gender fluidity with robotics is definitely a debated subject.

Alan Winfield, a Professor of Robotics at the University of the West of England, Bristol, has some “serious doubts about the morality of designing and building robots to resemble men or women, boys or girls.” He says that designing a robot with a gender is deceptive. Giving robots a gender does not have “any meaningful sense.” Therefore, he feels by “gendering and especially sexualising robots we surely objectify.” Meaning the robots are no longer an object but a sexual representation of a woman or man. Hence, he says “sexualised robots will surely only deepen the already acute problem of the objectification of real women and girls.” So, non-gender specific robots could well be potential sexual partners in the future (Winfield, 2016).

People will one day (between 2050 and 2065, depending on their budget) be able to use an android body as their own or even swap bodies with another person. Some will do so to be young again; many will do so to swap gender. Lots will do both. Genders can be swapped in computer games, why not “come back” and live all over again as a woman for real?.

5 Input from Interviewees

Malak Al Akiely

Managing Director of Golden Wheat for Grain Trading and Cofounder of Golden Kayan for Oil & Energy

The impact of robotics and AI will be profound; I am on the optimistic side about more acceptance to who we are and what we can be - where visualization becomes a reality! Positive human interaction, mental resiliency, and spiritual communication skills will be more essential and vital to our true human identity, existence, and beyond.

Georgie Benardete

Cofounder Futurian

The global legalization of psychedelics in 2030 will reconnect us to presence and love, and we will search for a post-Tinder, intimate quality in our sexual and human interactions.

Silvia Console Battilana

Angel investor and CEO Auctionomics

Will virtual avatars have incorporated sensors to make remote intimacy possible for couples that are apart? And will you get young generations be shy about in person contacts if the virtual version is somehow enhanced?

Carola Ferstl

Author, journalist, and media personality

I hope that there will continue to be physical interaction between humans. Nonetheless, I believe that technology will enable us to create emotions and sexual hormones artificially, which will hopefully allow everyone to benefit from sexuality. And dissatisfaction will be a thing from the past.

Rossana Figuera

Founder and CEO of Soul Pod Collective

Plant medicine has rapidly elevated the collective consciousness of the human race, once in the verge of extinction. We now understand that there is no “other.” We relate to each other as one in harmony with the natural world of which we are part of. Masculine and feminine exist in perfect polarity, relaxed in the protection and safety they grant each other. We continue to evolve and grow, bound by the universal, infinite source that binds us all: love.

Sadiq Gillani

Thought leader on the travel industry and career/self-development

By 2050, we will move beyond pronouns and labels of sexuality, opening up rather than limiting ourselves.

Rebeca Hwang

Professor of Practice at Thunderbird School of Management and Partner at Kalei Ventures

Today’s popular deep fakes are the pinnacle of a trend of performative human interaction that has been brewing for a while: social media videos highlighting fake glamorous lifestyles, short-lived relationships that need to look and sound evolved, and selfies intending to misrepresent influence and access. Influencers who don’t quite influence much are rather enslaved to a self-esteem barometer subject to popular validation.

The backlash will be rotund. The next decades will witness the comeback of the desire of deep and genuine connections. Sex—both in terms of gender identity and the sexual act—will become mediums for meaningful linkages, because in so many other realms, the tie is weak. Physical, tangible, and palpable connection through sex will contrast with the more widespread interaction with avatars, metaverse, and digital versions of humans. Sex will regain its functional role: not the historical reproductive goal, but rather, the bridging of humans via a material and substantive interaction.

Lily Lapenna

Founder and CEO of GLEOW Group

Beyond 2050, love will remain the core of the human endeavor. The most important currency will be longevity. The human obsession with extending life is driven by the desire to prolong the experience of love in all its forms. Living into the hundreds will allow us to love across more generations, to have sex, and to procreate until much later in life. Older parents on average will remain youthful, connected, healthy, and energetic and will live to be great great grandparents. Innovation in science, technology, and psychology will allow for us to pursue love for longer.

Pia Mancini

Democracy activist, open source sustainer, cofounder and CEO at Open Collective, and Chair of DemocracyEarth Foundation

The future of identity in 2050 will be both planetary and unique. The future I see or maybe the one I want to see—I am an optimist at heart—is one where human interactions happen at a planetary scale. We have finally been able to move beyond our fragmented identities long enough to see ourselves as peers that steward a commons, this planet. At the same time, identities (including gender and life choices) will increasingly diversify to the point of being unique. That hyper-diversification makes them less fragmented as tribes will become smaller and smaller.

Kate Roberts

Founder and CEO of The Body Agency

In 2050, sexual contact between person and an electronic device or a robot will occur more frequently than between two people.

I see the future of sex and gender in 2050 to be stigma and taboo free, to have the health products and services freely available to both genders equally, and to give equal importance on the reproductive years of a woman as well as menopause and beyond.