Papers
7
Total Citations
208
H-Index
5
About
Lily Frank is a philosopher and ethicist whose research sits at the compelling intersection of human-robot interaction, moral psychology, and technology ethics. She is best known for her pioneering work on the social and ethical dimensions of sex and love robots, exploring questions that few scholars had previously dared to formalize. Her widely cited 2017 paper on robot sex and consent (87 citations) established a rigorous framework for examining whether meaningful consent is conceivable in human-robot sexual encounters, while her companion piece on mutual love with robots (51 citations) offered one of the first systematic philosophical treatments of whether robots could be genuine partners in loving relationships. Frank's work extends beyond romantic and sexual contexts: she has investigated how people assign moral accountability to robots, finding that humans may be more willing to punish than to blame them, and has examined transparency challenges in morally charged human-robot interactions. Her more recent scholarship addresses the deployment of conversational agents in mental healthcare, reflecting a broadening concern for responsible AI integration in vulnerable settings. With nearly 210 cumulative citations, Frank has emerged as a distinctive and intellectually courageous voice shaping how society thinks about robots, personhood, and moral responsibility.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1
- 2From Sex Robots to Love Robots: Is Mutual Love with a Robot Possible?51 citations · 2017
- 3It Loves Me, It Loves Me Not35 citations · 2019
- 4People May Punish, Not Blame, Robots25 citations · 2021
- 5Here’s Looking at You, Robot: The Transparency Conundrum in HRI5 citations · 2023
- 6Emotional Embodiment in Humanoid Sex and Love Robots3 citations · 2022
- 7