VR Porn – Too Real To Be Good (For You)?

addicted to virtual reality porn
VirtualRealPorn new movie - too real to be good
Too real to be good? Photo courtesy of VirtualRealPorn.com

I recently highlighted a German study published last month that shone a positive light on VR porn, and its difference to the experience of viewing regular 2D porn. The study found that viewing 3D porn in virtual reality was felt to be more positive and real than ordinary porn consumption, and reasonably compared it to the different kind of mindless gratification experienced by somebody flicking through porn tube videos. But of course, there are many out there who will feel that the intimate and real aspect of virtual reality porn is the very thing that might make it so more dangerous, or at least perhaps threatening to them.

We’ve seen recently porn under attack like never before, and as the war on porn heats up with activists emboldened by their success against mighty Pornhub, it’s inevitable that virtual reality porn will be in their crosshairs sooner or later. Especially as VR appears to be at last gaining momentum, and their other target – sex robots- are still not here yet.

First They Came For The Sex Robots, Then They Came For VR Porn…

A negative piece on virtual reality porn (or ‘virtual reality sex’) appeared last month (I only just came across it), which shows what might be in store. Published, complete with footnotes, on what purports to be an online science magazine summarizing latest research, it appears to be nothing more than a clickbait opinion piece, written by a ‘PHD Candidate’ (i.e. a graduate), and designed to evoke a moral panic in the reader.

VR sex platforms are not science fiction. There are devices on the market currently that stimulate human genitalia in synchrony with visuals and sounds from VR headsets, with much more powerful technologies in the pipeline [5]. Companies are even buying the rights to use the likeness of porn actors and actresses, creating 3D scans of their bodies for use in simulations [5,6].

With better AI, companies will no longer even require the rights to specific people. AI will generate a near-infinite number of digital sexual partners with stimuli so detailed it will be difficult to tell they’re not real people. In fact, some VR sex experiences will be designed for users to engage in acts that are impossible, socially unacceptable, and illegal in the real world.

Not sure what’s supposed to be wrong with any of that.

He goes on to conclude..

VR sex platforms will use algorithms that compile your data to construct sexual experiences just for you. These experiences will be fine-tuned to your current mood – they will recognize your deepest, primal urges before you do.

The implications of this are not hard to imagine. AI algorithms will quickly learn what buttons to push and when, making the experience highly addictive. Perhaps your sexual preferences could be altered by your AI companion’s suggestions. If humans have access to an infinite set of virtual partners that know what they want in any given moment, how will people’s desire to seek out sexual experiences with one another be impacted? Perhaps humans will become so accustomed to “perfected” VR sex experiences, that the thought of intimacy with another “imperfect” human won’t even be arousing.

With first-person, embodied, VR sex experiences, people will feel physical stimulation, and see their virtual bodies being stimulated. They will be convinced that the virtual world is their world, and that their virtual body is their body. Relationships as we know them could be reshaped. It’s time to prepare for this possibility, and that begins by talking about it.

In other words, sexual nirvana will be open to every human being on the planet with a VR headset. And a subscription to VirtualRealPorn of course…

About xhumanist

Xhumanist has been writing on porn/sex tech for nearly two decades, and has been predicting the rise of VR and AR porn, as well as AI porn, and their coming together to produce fully 'immersive porn', which would be indistinguishable from the real thing, and create a society of 'sexual abundance'. He identifies as a digisexual, and has been quoted in Wired Magazine.

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