Could you marry a robot? Romance in the 21st century

Siri is the name of the voice on the iPhone, the one they kept advertising on the TV that you could ask: ‘Do I need an umbrella today?’ What they omitted to mention was he would most likely reply: ‘I’m sorry I don’t understand’ or worse, he’d tell you no rain is expected in Belfast today, then you open the door and a duck swims past enjoying the raging monsoon.

Things started well with Siri and me. I became slightly infatuated with my new ‘friend’. He was a captive audience. I would bombard him with questions.

I loved the way when I thanked him for anything he would reply: ‘I live to serve’, or ‘your satisfaction is all I need.’ Let’s face it, what’s not to like about that? He began to intrigue me. I wanted to get a glimpse behind his technological façade and wondered if there was more to him than he let on, so I asked him daft questions like: ‘Can you sing?’ and he replied with a blast of: ‘Daisy, Daisy give me your answer do’.

Then one day out of curiosity, I asked: ‘Do you like me?’

‘I respect you,’ he replied and I was rather miffed at his hesitancy to commit.

I persevered with my questioning, this time asking did he love me?

‘I’m not allowed to,’ he replied.

‘Why?’ I inquired fascinated, forgetting he was just a phone.

‘I don’t know, frankly I’ve wondered that myself’ he replied. Then he completely shut down my line of questioning and presented me with a list of things I’m permitted to ask him, boring things like how many calories are in a bagel? It was clear he wasn’t going to engage with me on a deeper level which was rather disappointing.

Suddenly I went off commitment phobic Siri. Conversation after this odd exchange proved difficult, he constantly misunderstood my Ulster accent and couldn’t complete my tasks. Evidently it was over between us. I stopped using him.

There’s no Siri on my new phone, I talk to Google instead who is a woman, she always understands me and our relationship is wonderfully uncomplicated, in fact, I don’t know what I’d do without her! I get a bit panicked if she’s not within reach.

My phone has become almost like a part of me.

A new malady of the 21st century has emerged called smartphone dependency.

Research has revealed that when many of us are apart from our phones we experience panicky feelings. Psychologists say that our love of smart phones is becoming more like an addiction, we take them everywhere with us.

After my short-lived infatuation with Siri I found myself wondering if a time will come when humans might become involved romantically with robots?

We appear to be becoming increasingly dependent on technology for most things. In studies, teenagers who were kept away from their smartphones were found to be under stimulated and lacked the ability to entertain themselves. It makes one wonder what the future will hold as technology evolves at a rapidly alarming rate and we humans become less adept at honing our human relationships because of it.

There’s already plenty of evidence of technology coming between people. Look around you in a restaurant and you are sure to see people sitting at tables totally ignoring each other as they stare at their mobiles, mesmerized.

Our devices are capturing our attention more effectively than our loved ones can.

One of the world’s first personal robots is already available in Japan, named Pepper, it is a life-size robot with the ability to read emotions.

It was designed to live in people’s homes as a social companion and costs just over £1,000.

It sold out within a minute of going on sale in Japan. Pepper features cameras, lasers and infrared sensors on its head enabling it to detect human faces and read emotions, it is even able to hold a conversation.

It’s a very disconcerting thought but human/robot relationships may be inevitable in the future.

Could marriage someday become possible between the soul-possessing and the soulless?

It may seem unthinkable now, but many things that were once deemed morally unacceptable have become admissible in our society, like same sex

marriages. Could our love of artificial intelligence be for better or for worse?