Post by Wes on Oct 7, 2010 14:45:51 GMT 10
Stop the war bots before they decide to kill us all, Australian bioethicist warns
AN Australian lecturer has warned of dangers to humanity if we continue further developing military robots.
Dr Robert Sparrow, senior lecturer for the Centre for Human Bioethics at Monash University, says that unmanned weapons systems encourage war and can give the "illusion of a god-like power".
Dr Sparrow is part of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control (ICRAC), a group dedicated to halting the development of robot weapons.
Their online mission statement states: "Machines should not be allowed to make the decision to kill people."
The committee held an "Expert Workshop" conference last month in Berlin to discuss the issues surrounding armed tele-operated and autonomous robot systems.
It's headed by controversial British scientist Professor Noel Sharkey, a professor of Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Public Engagement at Sheffield University.
Professor Sharkey has previously written about the dangers of autonomous war robots and their increasing decision-making capabilities, imagining "a little girl being zapped because she points her ice cream at a robot to share".
A press release on the ICRAC website says the meeting was attended by government officials, representatives of human rights organisations, arms control experts, philosophers, scientists and engineers.
The committee calls for restrictions on research and use of robotic weapons in their Statement of the 2010 Expert Workshop.
They hope that these parameters will help "to prevent the nightmare, so often foretold, of the loss of human control over the maintenance of security, the use of lethal force and the conduct of war, and of its surrender to an armed, autonomous technology".
However, the committee is not yet as concerned about Skynet waging war on the planet as they are about current robotic weapons.
Dr Sparrow told news.com.au that they would obviously be concerned if someone created and armed an Artificial Intelligence, but that the committee's main concern is with existing systems and "the way in which they have lowered the threshold of conflict".
He said the current robotic weapons "encourage governments to go to war where they otherwise wouldn’t be willing to because they think they can do it without incurring casualties in their own services".
"It gives an illusion of a god-like power that they can kill all the ‘bad’ people and there are few if any political problems that can be solved that way."
Citing Predator and Reaper drones used by the US military and the CIA against targets in Pakistan, Dr Sparrow said that the psychological separation provided by robot weapons between the attacker and their target is "complicated".
"In some ways, the people flying the Predator or the Reaper (the main drones), they see more of the consequences of their actions than someone who’s firing a cruise missile or dropping a bomb," he said.
"They actually see footage of the mangled corpses they leave behind.
"At the same time what they’re doing looks perilously close to playing a video game."
Robot weapons systems such as the drones have a reputation for deadly accuracy, but Dr Sparrow disputes this, saying that they cause significant rates of civilian casualties.
"If someone thinks these are really discriminate weapons systems, the question I ask is 'would you be happy to have them operating over the city of Melbourne?'"
The ICRAC's central members are Dr Sparrow, Professor Sharkey, German physicist and peace researcher Jürgen Altmann and American Professor Peter Asaro.
www.news.com.au/technology/australian-bioethicist-warns-of-robopocalypse/story-e6frfro0-1225934861279
AN Australian lecturer has warned of dangers to humanity if we continue further developing military robots.
Dr Robert Sparrow, senior lecturer for the Centre for Human Bioethics at Monash University, says that unmanned weapons systems encourage war and can give the "illusion of a god-like power".
Dr Sparrow is part of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control (ICRAC), a group dedicated to halting the development of robot weapons.
Their online mission statement states: "Machines should not be allowed to make the decision to kill people."
The committee held an "Expert Workshop" conference last month in Berlin to discuss the issues surrounding armed tele-operated and autonomous robot systems.
It's headed by controversial British scientist Professor Noel Sharkey, a professor of Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and Public Engagement at Sheffield University.
Professor Sharkey has previously written about the dangers of autonomous war robots and their increasing decision-making capabilities, imagining "a little girl being zapped because she points her ice cream at a robot to share".
A press release on the ICRAC website says the meeting was attended by government officials, representatives of human rights organisations, arms control experts, philosophers, scientists and engineers.
The committee calls for restrictions on research and use of robotic weapons in their Statement of the 2010 Expert Workshop.
They hope that these parameters will help "to prevent the nightmare, so often foretold, of the loss of human control over the maintenance of security, the use of lethal force and the conduct of war, and of its surrender to an armed, autonomous technology".
However, the committee is not yet as concerned about Skynet waging war on the planet as they are about current robotic weapons.
Dr Sparrow told news.com.au that they would obviously be concerned if someone created and armed an Artificial Intelligence, but that the committee's main concern is with existing systems and "the way in which they have lowered the threshold of conflict".
He said the current robotic weapons "encourage governments to go to war where they otherwise wouldn’t be willing to because they think they can do it without incurring casualties in their own services".
"It gives an illusion of a god-like power that they can kill all the ‘bad’ people and there are few if any political problems that can be solved that way."
Citing Predator and Reaper drones used by the US military and the CIA against targets in Pakistan, Dr Sparrow said that the psychological separation provided by robot weapons between the attacker and their target is "complicated".
"In some ways, the people flying the Predator or the Reaper (the main drones), they see more of the consequences of their actions than someone who’s firing a cruise missile or dropping a bomb," he said.
"They actually see footage of the mangled corpses they leave behind.
"At the same time what they’re doing looks perilously close to playing a video game."
Robot weapons systems such as the drones have a reputation for deadly accuracy, but Dr Sparrow disputes this, saying that they cause significant rates of civilian casualties.
"If someone thinks these are really discriminate weapons systems, the question I ask is 'would you be happy to have them operating over the city of Melbourne?'"
The ICRAC's central members are Dr Sparrow, Professor Sharkey, German physicist and peace researcher Jürgen Altmann and American Professor Peter Asaro.
www.news.com.au/technology/australian-bioethicist-warns-of-robopocalypse/story-e6frfro0-1225934861279