The New Companion
A short story
I’m not gonna lie to you: when I finally received the cybermail notification that my purchase was approved and I could pick it up from the Companions ‘R’ Us warehouse in Manchester, I was literally electrified. In fact, I was so excited that I decided to ‘throw a stickie’ (as they used to call it in the old days) and not show up at the institute that day. The boss was not going to like it, but they would have to live with it. I had waited long enough and just couldn’t bring myself to wait any longer. So I got myself some speed wheels and took off to get it.
The model I had ordered was rather pricey and I could hardly afford it, but it takes ages to make them — an entire decade or more, can you believe it? — and the one I got was the ultra-rare deluxe version, which had been virtually impossible to find for several years because the demand was just crazy. Everybody wanted one, and the few specimens that occasionally became available were immediately bought by scalpers who then went and sold them illegally on eBay for vast amounts. Yet in the end I got lucky, and in only a few hours I was going to ride back home with my very own ‘Lolita’ right next to me.
I should have mentioned that this particular range comes in two “sexes”, male and female, and I had picked a female one, which I thought was more suitable for my purposes. “Lolita” is what they call the female version of this particular type. (The male ones are called “Timmy”). Normally I would have just used Amazon, and have it sent to me, but all their workers were on strike that week, to protest, not for the first time, their supposedly meagre wages and unsafe working conditions. I nearly blew a fuse when I heard that. As far as I’m concerned, they shouldn’t be paid at all, and so what if it’s unsafe for them! Seriously, I mean, who cares if a few of them get crushed or fried to death every now and then. It’s not that they are real people, not even close.
Anyway, I was fairly confident my new companion would be worth the expense and the long wait. (The company that makes them strongly suggests that one should call it “her”, but I don’t think that would be appropriate, given what they are, so I’m not gonna do that.) Most of the reviews were excellent, except for a few that were all left by users who disliked the extent of the product’s so-called “autonomy”. I didn’t think I’d have a problem with that. I kind of like it when they appear to think for themselves and speak their mind, within limits of course. Then again, I never had one before, so I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into.
Photo by Alexander Krivitskiy on Unsplash
But then things started to go wrong almost immediately. When I arrived at the warehouse, it was already waiting for me at the loading dock. I stopped, opened the porthole, and it climbed in, very pretty and cute with a trim figure, pecan brown skin, black hair, and cobalt blue eyes, just as advertised, but also with a sullen look on its face that I didn’t much care for. I had expected it to appear a little more, I don’t know, upbeat or something. I tried to make it talk, but despite my best efforts I couldn’t get a single word out of it. It simply kept staring at me, which I found rather unsettling. There was something in its blue eyes that looked very much like fear, but I knew that was impossible. It’s true, there are some who believe that these things are in fact conscious, just like we are, but I’m not buying it. Frankly, I think it’s utter nonsense. They are not capable of feeling anything. Unlike us, they are not aware of their existence. They don’t think, they don’t feel, and that’s all pretty obvious. Sure, it may look as if they did, but we know it’s not real. We know there’s no ‘there’ there. The so-called “experts” that claim otherwise have no idea what they are talking about. Just think about it. How could something that has been created entirely out of natural materials and that has no built-in mental functions ever be conscious? For something to be aware of itself and the world around it, it would have to be engineered that way, and we all know that this is not the case here. There’s simply no way something so momentous as the emergence of consciousness in a material construct could just happen, all by itself. No way, I say.
Where was I? Oh yes. Because I couldn’t make it talk I thought it was faulty. I was sure that it was supposed to be able to converse like a proper person, and it just didn’t do that. So when we got home I made it sit down and told it to open its mouth. When it did, I had a good look inside just to make sure there wasn’t anything obviously broken that I could easily fix myself, but I found nothing. I then consulted the relevant mindbook, which advised patience. I learned that apparently it is a common problem – and not only with this particular range – that they can stay silent for a long time. Eventually, however, they were all going to talk.
And that’s exactly what happened. On the second day, it suddenly opened its mouth and said, “I am hungry. I want to eat.” Naturally, I was relieved that it was indeed able to speak, but what it said took me by surprise. I knew that it needed to be watered frequently, and I had done that, but solid food? I again consulted my trusty mindbook, which confirmed it. Without solid food, it said, the thing will expire very quickly. This caused me quite a headache (in a manner of speaking) because I had nothing in the house that it could eat. (Believe me, I tried, but it refused to swallow it.) Even worse, I had no idea where I was going to get what it needed. According to the mindbook, Britain no longer produces food for them, so it had to be specially ordered from a Scottish manufacturer, and with all the borders being tightly controlled now it would take a whole week to arrive. But what choice did I have? I ordered a year’s supply and hoped for the best.
That was honestly the longest week of my life. Personally, I wouldn’t have minded the wait all that much, but ‘Lolita’ had zero patience, which I found rather irritating. It got very cranky, constantly moaning and whining, and was not much fun at all. By the time the foodstuff finally arrived in a huge container, my precious purchase had lost a third of its weight and was no longer such a pretty sight. Its hair had lost its shine, the skin had a yellow tinge, and its eyes were dull and blank. The food helped of course, and I eventually managed to restore it to roughly its original appearance and constitution. It took some time, though.
It’s now been a year since ‘Lolita’ came into my life as my “brand new companion”. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not all bad, there are ups and downs, but all things considered, it has been a very disappointing experience, and if you are thinking of getting one yourself, you better think again. It’s just too much trouble. To be clear, ‘Lolita’ does talk now, quite a lot actually, but unfortunately it hasn’t got all that much to say. Or at least nothing worth hearing. Truth be told, it is pretty dumb, even for an NI. That’s probably because it has only limited access to data. But that’s not the worst of it. It also cries a lot and routinely demands to be “loved”, whatever that means. It also gets dirty real quick and doesn’t put things where they belong. It makes everything messy, which I find unacceptable. One should think they would have come up with some basic improvements by now. And this is supposed to be an advanced model. Seriously?
Since I’m also running out of food again, it’s about time I got rid of it. I guess I could just destroy it, which apparently is very easy to do. Nobody would say anything because they don’t have any rights. I have a better idea, though. For some reason, there are still plenty of suckers out there who would pay anything to get their hands on a pet human. Synths can be surprisingly stupid sometimes. So what I’m gonna do is sell it on eBay. With a little luck I might even make a decent profit, so the whole thing wasn’t a complete waste of time. Digits crossed.
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Michael Hauskeller is Professor of Philosophy and Head of the Philosophy Department at the University of Liverpool, UK. He specializes in moral and existential philosophy, but has also done work in various other areas, most notably phenomenology (the theory of atmospheres), the philosophy of art and beauty, and the philosophy of human enhancement.
His publications include Biotechnology and the Integrity of Life (Routledge 2007), Better Humans? Understanding the Enhancement Project (Routledge 2013), Sex and the Posthuman Condition (Palgrave Macmillan 2014), The Palgrave Handbook of Posthumanism in Film and Television (ed. with T. Philbeck and C. Carbonell, Palgrave 2015), Mythologies of Transhumanism (Palgrave Macmillan 2016), Moral Enhancement. Critical Perspectives (ed. with L. Coyne, Cambridge University Press 2018), and The Meaning of Life and Death (Bloomsbury 2019).
Cover image by Alexander Krivitskiy on Unsplash.
