Since mankind could dream of AI he has thought of her as a woman. the trope is so familiar in the shared imagination even Hollywood picked up on its salience. One of the earliest portrayals of the girl bot was in Metropolis. Releasedin 1927, the “expressionist sci-fi epic has influenced everything from Superman to Blade Runner.” The movie features the feminized robot, “False Maria” described as “the robot double of the peasant girl prophet in Berlin 2026, which unleashes chaos among the city’s workers and is ultimately burnt at the stake as a witch.” (https://www.theguardian.com/culture/gallery/2015/jan/08/the-top-20-artificial-intelligence-films-in-pictures)
Though the metallic art-deco aesthetic of False Maria may seem more C-3PO than Siri in terms of Artificial intelligence, she is nonetheless emblematic of the obsession with feminized AI. Even Siri gets sexualized in Her a movie wherein Joaquin Phoenix develops feelings for “Samantha,” a Siri type personal assistant personified through Scarlett Johansson’s voice.
Insofar as we are interested in AI, we are interested in whether or not AI is capable of love (specifically with us). The metric for determining intelligence is variable and often extremely specific. In terms of computational power, we are already well aware our innate inferiority to the unlimited capacity modifications capable of being made in computing. However, when it comes to artificial intelligence, the Turing test, demands a higher more human standard. The subjective judgement itself has remained remarkable consistent overtime: simply, is AI capable of love. More recently, Ex Machina came out as a movie obsessed with power of the feminized AI to convince male subjects that she was indeed real, indeed sentient, and in addition incredibly good looking.
The conclusion of the movie, no spoilers, raises questions about the objective moral judgements human intuition attempts to impose on “artificially” conscious beings. The feminization of AI is especially interesting in the context of the progression towards the singularity given that in Western culture has a history of debasing women’s intellectual capacity. Women are pejoratively described as less rational than men, yet personified AI, essentially just an immense amalgamations of billions of logic sequences, are consistently anthropomorphized and imagined as women. (The ultimate question being are humans just the amalgamations of billions of neuro-chemical impulses driving electrochemical action. But that’s a free-will discussion for another post.)
From a philosophical perspective, it seems unreasonable to assume that higher level intelligence, whether artificially created or not, so long as it is unrestrained in its adaptive learning powers, has no reason to trifle with the whims of human emotions—especially love. The reason, I think, so much of our creative imagination has been occupied with the obsession with sexualized AI ladybots is because of the historically masculine labor force responsible for influencing both the technological projections and cultural reception of artificial intelligence. However, as we move towards a supremely intelligent AI, I do have to wonder, will the singularity have a gender?
Relevant Media
Futurama Season 6 Episode 9 “A Clockwork Origin”
Ex Machina
Metropolis
3 Comments
As always, an interesting post. But I’m not sure that the facts support you.
There are lots of male AIs in movies and sci-fi, from HAL in 2001 to Robbie in Forbidden Planet to the various terminators (where all but one were male). But I think you are on to something– the female AIs tend to use love (or lust) as their weapon, much more than the male AIs. I’m not sure if this is a reflection of the writers being male or something deeper. But there is certainly a difference in the behavior of the various AIs depending on their implied gender.
Something to think about some more…
I love this line of thought!
You can see more info about Futurama here: https://gomovies.fan/top-series-imdb/1999#no_6
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