Binge watching to blame for decline in sex, says professor
Technically Incorrect: A Cambridge University statistics professor says binge watching shows like "Game of Thrones" is dampening our sex lives.
Technically Incorrect offers a slightly twisted take on the tech that's taken over our lives.
Better than sex?
Has the thrill gone?
Is it only an occasional thrill?
Do you even remember the thrill?
Or are you getting all your thrills by watching episode after episode of "Game of Thrones"?
Please, you can be honest here. I have some data to help you open up. It comes from David Spiegelhalter, Cambridge University's Winton Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk.
As The Telegraph reports, Spiegelhalter was speaking last weekend at the Hay Festival in the UK when he offered a worrisome prospect: There's a risk that sex is about to die.
And it's all Netflix's fault. Well, and Amazon Prime's. And HBO's.
He explained that in 1990 couples reported having sex five times a month. Now it's down to three times.
By 2030, it could be down to no getting down to it at all.
But why?
"You say why?" he said, hearing me correctly. "Statisticians say, I don't know. One of the researchers mentioned the word 'iPad.' I think it's the box set, Netflix. OMG, I've got to watch the entire second series of 'Game of Thrones.'"
Could it be that we're now getting our buzz by watching the t*** and dragons -- show star Ian McShane's words -- of "Game of Thrones, rather than creating our own late-night spectacle?
"The point is...this massive connectivity, the constant checking of our phones compared to just a few years ago when TV closed down at 10:30 p.m. or whatever and there was nothing else to do," he said.
Sex was great when there wasn't great TV. Now, not so much. And if we want sex, we can have it anytime on PornHub.
Perhaps, though, there's a psychological positive in all this. If we're putting ourselves off sex, it's good preparation for the days when we all have nanobots in our heads telling us what to do, think and feel.
If we need to procreate, the bots will tell us when to do it and for how long.
The rest of the time, we'll focus on the nano-size bottoms on "Game of Thrones."