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Not Quite a T-1000, But On the Right Track

Posted by Unknown on from the dancing-robot-death-machines dept.

New submitter misanthropic.mofo writes with a look at the the emerging field of robtic warfare. Adding, "Leaping from drones, to recon 'turtlebots', humanity is making its way toward robo-combat. I for one think it would make it interesting to pit legions of robot warriors against each other and let people purchase time on them. Of course there are people that are for and against such technology. Development of ethical robotic systems seems like it would take some of the fun out of things, there's also the question of who gets to decide on the ethics."

33 of 159 comments (clear)

  1. Sigh by Kell+Bengal · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hello - robotics researcher here (specialising in UAVs). I wonder when these breathless articles about battlefield robotics will end. There is nothing new about battlefield robots - we've had tomahawk missiles since the early 80s. It's just that these days we think about them as robots rather than as cruise missiles. Drone strikes? What about the missile strikes from the Gulf War? They were the champions of good and (along with stealth technology) the gold hammer of the Forces of Good.

    The only thing that has changes is more penetration of robots into our militaries and more awareness of some of the ethical considerations of automated weapons. Don't forget - the machine gun and landmine have killed far more people than drones likely ever will. They kill mindlessly so long as the trigger was pulled or they are stepped on. And yet, their ethical considerations were long debated. It's just that "omg a robot!" is headline magic.

    (To whit - the author of this article must not know that much about robotics if they're claiming "The turtlebot could reconnoitre a battlesite". No it can't - it's a glorified vacuum cleaner. I just kicked the one in my lab. It can barely get over a bump in the carpet.)

    Let's focus on the real ethics of robotic warfare: how our leaders choose to use the tools we have made.

    --
    Scientists point out problems, engineers fix them
    altslashdot.org: The future of slashdot.
    1. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The only thing that has changes is more penetration of robots into our militaries and more awareness of some of the ethical considerations of automated weapons. Don't forget - the machine gun and landmine have killed far more people than drones likely ever will. They kill mindlessly so long as the trigger was pulled or they are stepped on. And yet, their ethical considerations were long debated. It's just that "omg a robot!" is headline magic.

      Both machine guns and landmines are pretty easy to avoid: Go where they are not.
      The game changes when the killing device can move itself around and decides (by itself) if it wants to kill you.

    2. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I think the sticking point that you might be missing is that we're reaching a point where it's in the mind of the public as conceivable, that we're getting to a point where robot autonomy is becoming more mainstream. There are certain ethical questions that go along with a program that is going from targeting something specifically to making decisions on potential targets. People see every day more and more advanced drones performing all sorts of little mini miracles of tossing sticks around and creating small structures that leads people to see a pattern of "higher function" for lack of a better wording and they are drawing lines into the future of "if robots can do THAT now, what will they be able to do down the road"

      I think the future of robotics has very serious ethical concerns that should probably be addressed before they NEED to be addressed.

    3. Re:Sigh by hairyfish · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Both machine guns and landmines are pretty easy to avoid: Go where they are not.

      Like a movie theatre for instance? a School maybe? What about summer camp? Or the humble old supermarket?

    4. Re:Sigh by Jeremi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Both machine guns and landmines are pretty easy to avoid: Go where they are not.

      Landmines have an annoying habit of being buried where you can't see them. This makes it difficult to ensure that you are going where they are not.

      --


      I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
    5. Re:Sigh by nedlohs · · Score: 2

      There were no machine guns or landmines used in any of those, so yes.

    6. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The other obvious issue is the "arms race" aspect to this discussion. If it is mandated that all robots are designed not to kill humans, you can guarantee that someone will make one that doesn't comply, or complies conditionally.
      Something about genies and bottles.

    7. Re:Sigh by camperdave · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Landmines have an annoying habit of being buried where you can't see them.

      Plus they have the nasty habit of remaining active long after the conflict has ceased.

      --
      When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
    8. Re:Sigh by cold+fjord · · Score: 2

      Both machine guns and landmines are pretty easy to avoid: Go where they are not.

      Like a movie theatre for instance? a School maybe? What about summer camp? Or the humble old supermarket?

      Yes, as explained in the second line of the quote - you know, the one you omitted.

      Both machine guns and landmines are pretty easy to avoid: Go where they are not.
      The game changes when the killing device can move itself around and decides (by itself) if it wants to kill you.

      I suppose I should commend in at least a left handed fashion. You did manage to turn what is essentially an off-topic or redundant remark into a +5 insightful by showing instances of what the parent to your post directly stated and which you glossed over. I guess it must be time we rehash the whole violence / gun violence / "assault weapon" topic in this discussion on robotics / drones since I'm not sure it has otherwise come up today on Slashdot, has it?

      --
      much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
    9. Re:Sigh by cold+fjord · · Score: 2

      And those people are wrong.

      --
      much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
    10. Re:Sigh by Phrogman · · Score: 2

      The difference between being killed by an semi-automatic rifle and being killed by a machinegun (sub or otherwise) is lost on me. The point was that previous technologies have most likely killed more people than the newer technologies will (particularly as the newer technologies will most likely incorporate some of the older technologies), not to argue whether the person got their terms exactly right.
      And in the popular mind I would agree, the distinction between semi-automatic and machine guns is generally lost. The average person probably thinks the categories are: pistol, shotgun, rifle, machinegun and thats pretty much it.

      --
      "The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
    11. Re:Sigh by rohan972 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The difference between being killed by an semi-automatic rifle and being killed by a machinegun (sub or otherwise) is lost on me.

      If someone is specifically talking about the risk of being killed by one or the other it becomes relevant, otherwise not so much.

      The average person probably thinks the categories are: pistol, shotgun, rifle, machinegun and thats pretty much it.

      I aspire to more intelligent discussion than the average person I suppose. I don't see how this is possible unless words are used correctly.

      When people with a political agenda of banning guns use incorrect terminology that confuses semi-auto with full auto weapons it seems like they are deliberately obfuscating the issue to exploit the average persons ignorance. That requires correction, unless you're in favor of deceiving people to sway their political opinion. I know that's a popular tactic to the point of being near universal but I always live in hope of conversing with people who prioritize truth over their own opinion.

      --
      http://marriedmansexlife.com/
    12. Re:Sigh by gr8_phk · · Score: 2

      Don't forget - the machine gun and landmine have killed far more people than drones likely ever will. They kill mindlessly so long as the trigger was pulled or they are stepped on. And yet, their ethical considerations were long debated.

      Don't forget that landmines were not just debated, for the most part they have been banned IIRC. The ethical considerations were not debated - the problem was clear - what went on for a long time was deciding what to do about them.

      And let us not forget, a large scale robot war would be won by the country with the best manufacturing capability. ;-)

    13. Re:Sigh by camperdave · · Score: 2

      The average person probably thinks the categories are: pistol, shotgun, rifle, machinegun and thats pretty much it.

      I aspire to more intelligent discussion than the average person I suppose. I don't see how this is possible unless words are used correctly.

      It's an age old problem. Experts in a field will classify things differently than those who are not in the field. Are tomatos a fruit, or a vegetable? It depends who you are talking to. Culinarily, a tomato is a vegetable because it is used in savoury dishes rather than sweet ones. Botanically, it is a fruit - a berry actually - because it consists of the ovary of the plant. Different set of people; different definitions and classifications; same object being discussed. The average person is not incorrect when they say a particular weapon is a machine gun, because their context is visual appearance, not firing process.

      So, if you aspire to more intelligent discussion, the first part of any conversation is going to be the establishment of a common context.

      --
      When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
    14. Re:Sigh by rubycodez · · Score: 2

      we passed the point of "machines deciding what to kill" in the 13th century, too bad you missed it. I'm referring to land mines in the Song Dynasty,a pin released falling weight that pulled via cord a flint wheel sparking system. Being heavy enough, and stepping in a designated place to fire the booby trap was the deciding factor.

  2. Not sure if a Robot Army is a good idea. by Lisias · · Score: 2

    Billions of dollars can be deactivated by a simple PEM.

    You know... the bombs that emits an electro-magnetic pulse that disables everything that are digital...

    They are so simple to build that USA would restrain itself from use them, as the enemy would easily figure out how to build one by analyzing the bomb's scraps...

    --
    Lisias@Earth.SolarSystem.OrionArm.MilkyWay.Local.Virgo.Universe.org
    1. Re:Not sure if a Robot Army is a good idea. by Sussurros · · Score: 2

      That's why the Russians still make vacuum tubes and possibly still use them in military equipment. Vacuum tube circuits are much more resistant to EMP attacks and as I recall the Soviets designed a few EMP weapons, although of course a nulcear bomb does a fine job as it comes.

      Small EMP devices are very easy to make and the designs for basic circuits were easily available in any large book store last time I looked for other books about electronics, maybe eight years ago. They always gave me a cold shiver when I came across them imagining one of the neighbouring kids making one and wiping out my computer.

      --
      I said - don't look Ethel!..., but it was too late..., she'd already looked.
    2. Re:Not sure if a Robot Army is a good idea. by viperidaenz · · Score: 3, Informative

      You know... the bombs that emits an electro-magnetic pulse that disables everything that are not adequately shielded...

      FTFY.
      I think you also mean EMP, not PEM.

  3. Re:Robot wars by icebike · · Score: 2

    And perhaps that will last just as long as it takes for one country to face defeat of its robots, whereupon a switch will be flipped and humans become a legitimate target for autonomous machines.

    You abhor drone strikes now, wait till there is no human in the loop.

    --
    Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
  4. Re:Do I have... by viperidaenz · · Score: 2

    Only if it has arms.

  5. Re:Pigeons? by fyngyrz · · Score: 2

    it interesting to pit pigeons

    I may be winging it, but I think you're just squabbling about the title.

    --
    I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
  6. The irony of military robotics by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 4, Insightful

    http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html
    "Military robots like drones are ironic because they are created essentially to force humans to work like robots in an industrialized social order. Why not just create industrial robots to do the work instead? ... There is a fundamental mismatch between 21st century reality and 20th century security thinking. Those "security" agencies are using those tools of abundance, cooperation, and sharing mainly from a mindset of scarcity, competition, and secrecy. Given the power of 21st century technology as an amplifier (including as weapons of mass destruction), a scarcity-based approach to using such technology ultimately is just making us all insecure. Such powerful technologies of abundance, designed, organized, and used from a mindset of scarcity could well ironically doom us all whether through military robots, nukes, plagues, propaganda, or whatever else... Or alternatively, as Bucky Fuller and others have suggested, we could use such technologies to build a world that is abundant and secure for all."

    There are only so many hours in the day. If we put those hours into finding new ways to kill other people and win conflicts, we will not be putting those hours into finding new ways to heal people and resolve conflicts. Langdon Winner talks about this topic in his writings when he explores the notion of whether artifacts have politics.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langdon_Winner

    Albert Einstein wrote, after the first use of atomic weapons, that everything had changed but our way of thinking. You make some good points about us long having cruise missiles, but on "forces of good", here is something written decades ago by then retired Marine Major General Smedley Butler:
    http://www.warisaracket.com/
    "WAR is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small "inside" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes. ..."

    Just because it was "hot" before, with cruise missiles and nukes and poison gases, does not mean we will be better off when our society reaches a boiling point -- with robotic soldiers and military AIs and speedier plagues and so on. Eventually quantitative changes (like lowering prices per unit) become qualitative changes. Every year our planet is in conflict is a year of risk of that conflict escalating into global disaster. So, the question is, do our individual actions add to that risk or take away from it?

    I'm impressed with what some UAVs can do in terms of construction vs. destruction, so obviously there is a lot of different possibilities in that field.
    http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/107217-real-life-constructicon-quadcopter-robots-being-developed

    --
    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
  7. Re:Robot wars by DigiShaman · · Score: 2

    It may start off as robot wars, but it will quickly end in a thermonuclear exchange. They are the trump card. They will always be the trump card.

    --
    Life is not for the lazy.
  8. Philosophy 101 by zedrdave · · Score: 2

    > there's also the question of who gets to decide on the ethics

    Yes. If only there was a body of work, say an entire branch of philosophy, dedicated to defining what ethics are, based on rigorous rational thinking and an axiomatic approach.

    1. Re:Philosophy 101 by clarkkent09 · · Score: 2

      Most of it is ridiculous, whether its based on "rigorous rational thinking and an axiomatic approach" or not (actually not). Besides, which ethics school do you apply? Consequentialists (ends justify the means a.k.a. screw the principles), utilitarians (happiness of the majority is key, a.k.a screw the minority), Pragmatists (whatever society decides ... so much for rigorous rational thinking) etc etc

      --
      Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
    2. Re:Philosophy 101 by zedrdave · · Score: 2

      You are mixing personal ethics and ethical theories that can be applied to a community (of people/countries).

      Given the question at hand, I'll venture a wild guess and say Military ethics are most applicable. You might know them (in large part) as the Nuremberg Code, Helsinki Declaration or the Geneva Convention. In the modern mainstream world (outside of religious/political nuts), there isn't a lot controversial about them. That is, until a country decides that breaking them might possibly give them an upper hand, thus effectively knowingly stepping outside defined ethical bounds.

    3. Re:Philosophy 101 by Sigg3.net · · Score: 2

      *sigh*

      Put it like this: ethics is the study of the human being. With that in mind, and a hypothetical ultimate morality as a goal, the truth of what we are must guide us. The endeavour must be scientific, which entails that some ethical theories are empirically false (Hobbes and children are inherently flawed, for instance) while appeals to religion is cultural and will often prove moot (understood as early attempts at the same task).

      How will a discussion about the "ultimate morality" come about with any hope of success? So far my money's on Habermas' Formal Pragmatics. It is an extremely important contribution but not easily understood.

      Please ask if you want clarification.

      When official institutions today talk about "ethics", however, it is paradigmatically Christian Protestant morality and not ethics proper.

      --
      Defining Statistics and Social Research
  9. Re:T-100, huh? by davester666 · · Score: 2

    Hell no. I know which is the winning side. I'm teaching the robots everything I can about other humans.

    --
    Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
  10. War is not a video game by kaldari · · Score: 2

    "Development of ethical robotic systems seems like it would take some of the fun out of things"

    What kind of twisted fantasy world are you guys living in? War means killing people. It isn't fun. It isn't a video game. And in response to Kell's comment above, we aren't the "Forces of Good" battling the "Forces of Evil". We are a nation state with imperfect leaders and selfish short-sighted goals just like every other nation state on the planet. The difference between having real armies and having robot armies is that robots don't suffer any decline in morale from massacring large numbers of civilians. Think about the implications of that for a minute.

  11. Re:Robot wars by Seumas · · Score: 2

    All the "robots" and machines in the world doing battle won't ever change the fact that only slaughtering young men and women (sent their, usually, by men wealthy men closer to their death than their birth) really has an impact on societies and the need to push for or withdraw from war. Frankly, not even much demand over humans these days, either as witnessed by the last twelve years.

  12. Re:Will sentient robots get the right to bear arms by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 3, Interesting

    "AI" has always been that which AI can't do. Here are several activities that once were considered sci-fi-level AI but are no longer considered AI in a broad sense because we know how to do them more-or-less:
    * Looking stuff up for us (Google);
    http://www.google.com/
    * Inferring questions from examples and answering questions posed in natural language (IBM's Watson);
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watson_(computer)
    * Generating hypotheses and doing hands/grippers-on scientific experiments (Adam);
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot_Scientist
    * Reading text in multiple fonts reliably and quickly and cheaply;
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_character_recognition
    * translating one human language to another on the fly;
    http://domino.watson.ibm.com/comm/research.nsf/pages/r.uit.innovation.html/
    http://www.gizmag.com/go/1833/
    * reading and translating signs;
    http://questvisual.com/us/
    * Making portraits;
    http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2012/11/tresset_robot_artist_artist_engineers_robots_to_make_art_and_save_his_own.single.html
    * Playing the piano including from sheet music;
    http://www.synthgear.com/2009/music-misc/synth-playing-robot/
    http://gizmodo.com/5963137/watch-this-adorable-horde-of-intelligent-swarm-robots-play-piano
    * Driving a car in busy traffic (Google, Stanford, CMU, others);
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_Grand_Challenge#2007_Urban_Challenge
    * Winning chess games (IBM's Deep Blue and pretty much any PC now against a mid-level player);
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_chess
    * Image recognition for quality control in factories;
    http://www.general-vision.com/products/mtvs.php
    * Recognizing faces;
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facial_recognition_system
    * Figuring out the name of a musical composition from a few notes as well as making new compositions and dynamic accompaniments;
    http://www.wikihow.com/Identify-Songs-Using-Melody
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_and_artificial_intelligence
    * The diagnostic aspect of being a doctor (Watson again);
    http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-02/11/ibm-watson-medical-doctor
    * Investing in volatile financial markets;
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_trading
    * Serving as a sentry with a machine gun;
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5YftEAbmMQ
    * Twirling a cell phone;
    http://www.hizook.com/blog/2009/08/03/high-speed-robot-hand-demonstrates-dexterity-and-skillful-manipulation
    * Identifying things by smell;

    --
    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
  13. Re:Robot wars by C0R1D4N · · Score: 3, Interesting

    In a war between robots, innocent civilians will be 100% of the casualties.

  14. Re:T-100, huh? by BagOCrap · · Score: 2

    Noticed it too. I just assumed the article submitter was progressing from T100 to T1000 network speeds.

    --
    -- Chaos, panic, pandemonium... My job here is done!