Having sex on the bonnet of your car when the car is a HUGE SENTIENT ROBOT

[jack]

Who'd have thunk the Transformers movie would raise interesting philosophical etiquette questions? You're probably tired of "So, can we eat sapient alien" questions, so let's have a different one.

Does privacy apply between species? Does it go with intelligence or compatible biology/mores?

I mean, me, I don't like having sex in front of cats or inflatable penguins, because I'm (most of the time) very private. Being naked in the flat is an occasional luxury rather than the norm. So it doesn't apply to me.

But if the aliens don't place any importance on sexual reproduction or pair bonding, and are friends, and don't gossip, does it matter?

You'd naturally think it does. In the Mote in God's Eye (insofar as Larry Niven is an authority on alien contact) the humans have to explain some aspects of privacy.

OTOH, in books where the sapient alien is pet-like, or an artificial intelligence, sometimes people don't care.

What actually would happen? Can we ever know until we *do* find sapient aliens?

Comments

[pogodragon.livejournal.com]

I'd think it depends both on whether the sapient alien cares/notices that this specific activity is qualitatively different to say, eating, which most humans are happy to do with others around/watching them, and also on how the humans involved in the sex feel.

I don't particularly like the cat being around when I'm having sex - if nothing else she's a critic of technique and tends to make her objections felt, with her claws.

Hmm, my answer seems to be - it depends.