What Makes a Caress?

A caress?  As opposed, that is, to a touch that is merely therapeutic?  The question can be an awkward one if you find yourself engaged with a massage therapist.  You, with your eyes closed and facing down, may feel that you are being caressed, while the masseuse may feel rather that she is kneading a loaf of pizza dough before putting it in the oven.

Intent and context certainly matter.  But Wittgenstein would remind us that the intent cannot be pulled out and abstracted from the context; we infer the intent in large part from the context.  

In the current New Age, it cannot be denied that a robot/android can be made whose caresses are indistinguishable from the real thing.  Another genius whose path crossed with Wittgenstein's, Alan Turing, would say that if you can't tell the difference, then there is no difference.

But I don't buy this particular and secondary Turing Test.  Must we really remember this, that a kiss is just a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh?  More fundamental things must apply.