This data is far too voluminous for human analysts, but not for AI. 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.