US Killer Robot Policy: Full Speed Ahead

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US Killer Robot Policy: Full Speed Ahead

Posted by Soulskill on Friday September 20, 2013 @06:33AM from the set-course-for-skynet dept.

Lasrick writes "Princeton's Mark Gubrud has an excellent piece on the United States killer robot policy. In 2012, without much fanfare, the U.S. announced the world's first openly declared national policy for killer robots. That policy has been widely misperceived as one of caution, according to Gubrud: 'A careful reading of the directive finds that it lists some broad and imprecise criteria and requires senior officials to certify that these criteria have been met if systems are intended to target and kill people by machine decision alone. But it fully supports developing, testing, and using the technology, without delay. Far from applying the brakes, the policy in effect overrides longstanding resistance within the military, establishes a framework for managing legal, ethical, and technical concerns, and signals to developers and vendors that the Pentagon is serious about autonomous weapons.'"

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Completely insane... by GuardianBob420 · 2013-09-20 06:37 · Score: 4, Insightful

I'm not even sure what else to say here... so much for the Three Laws ;-)
1. Re:Completely insane... by vux984 · 2013-09-20 06:59 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  The Three Laws were EXPRESSLY invented to show why such a simple system will not work.
  The three laws were expressly invented to make a system that works.
  He then spent extensive amounts of time exploring them for unintended consequences and corner cases where they did not work.
  It is frustrating people think '3 laws safe'.
  Its FAR more frustrating that rather than trying to -fix- the edge cases Asimov uncovered with the 3 laws (later 4 laws), we've decided to just go full steam ahead without any laws at all with robots designed for the sole purpose of killing us.
2. Re:Completely insane... by squiggleslash · 2013-09-20 07:49 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  That, perhaps, might be Will Smith's interpretation of Asimov's novels, but it's not any sane reader's interpretation.
  Asimov's novels are pretty clear, the three laws do, in fact, restrict the robots from being OUT OF CONTROL KILLING MACHINES!!1!. There are only two appearances of such robots (and then, they're hardly described by such a term) - one short story, whose name I forget, has a deliberately weakened set of laws in it. The other is, of course, Giskard and Daneel's formulation of the zeroth law, where, again, the robots are no longer obeying, exactly, the three laws.
  What Asimov does do is describe the consequences of the three laws, showing them to be imperfect in terms of creating universal machines, but effective at preventing the robots from going out and killing everyone.
  Asimov's motivation for creating the three laws was to deal with the plethora of inane "Scientist builds perfect universal machine, doesn't realize that a perfect machine will kill maker until it's too late" stories that started entirely legitimately with Frankenstein but then descended into cliche hell, as story teller after story teller thought it was wildly original to pretend that scientists are dumb and would build destroyers of the universe to prove how clever they were. Annoyed, he wrote a set of rules and then wrote story after story explaining them. The stories didn't debunk the rules, or show they wouldn't work. The stories usually showed that they did, and worked in unexpected ways.
  
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  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
3. Re:Completely insane... by Charliemopps · 2013-09-20 08:13 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  These are AI laws. They have nothing to do with what we have now, as we don't have any real AIs. Our governments use of these will basically be machine guns with servos that shoot anything that moves or possibly drones that are authorized to shoot anyone identified with a weapon in hand in a given area. If we actually had real AIs I'd be less concerned, but having a computer that's likely not any more intelligent than my smartphone or, at best, my desktop PC decide if someone should be killed or not is terrifying.
4. Re:Completely insane... by Anonymous Coward · 2013-09-20 08:24 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  > Its FAR more frustrating that rather than trying to -fix- the edge cases Asimov uncovered with the 3 laws (later 4 laws), we've decided to just go full steam ahead without any laws at all with robots designed for the sole purpose of killing us.
  It's simple. Robots will follow orders. They will have no qualms about executing illegal orders. No issues with killing civilians. No hesitation about killing the very population that they were supposedly built to protect.
  Amy and police might actually not gun down a mob of 1000s just to protect a couple of corrupt and powerful fucks. They didn't in Egypt. The elite know this... so they need robots who will protect them unconditionally.
Did you expect something different? by Lucas123 · 2013-09-20 06:40 · Score: 4, Insightful

It would be pretty darned hypocritical of us to indiscriminately bomb people and then say that you shouldn't use A.I. driven robots because it's too impersonal a way to kill people.
1. Re:Did you expect something different? by Anonymous Coward · 2013-09-20 07:13 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Yeah, no. Most people object to it because fully autonomous killing machines cannot be more reliable than our most advanced fully autonomous non-killing machines are now. The objection is less about indiscriminately bombing people within the designated target area than it is about a glitch causing the "designated target area" to change from the actual target to...oh, I dunno, a lone seagull on the beach? The moon? A city 5000km away from the original target? The base which initially launched the drone and contains the only manual override for the device?
  The public at large is ok with atrocities as long as they're pointed as "those people" and not themselves. Fully autonomous means there is even less of a guarantee of it being pointed at themselves.
Frightening thought by Dunbal · 2013-09-20 06:42 · Score: 5, Insightful

It's a chilling thought that the world's largest state sponsor of terrorism is also pioneering drone and robotics technology. I guess some bright spark somewhere decided he can get around international law by just having the machines do the killing, because "there's no law against machines doing it, right?"
Most Americans turn around and say "what law are we breaking?". How about this one, from the UN General Assembly: "No State may use or encourage the use of economic, political or any other type of measures to coerce another State in order to obtain from it the subordination of the exercise of its sovereign rights or to secure from it advantages of any kind. Also, no State shall organize, assist, foment, finance, incite or tolerate subversive, terrorist, or armed activities directed towards the violent overthrow of the regime of another State, or interfere in civil strife in another State." Don't even get me started on "targeted killing" or "extrajudicial killing", which is just summary execution without trial. Even Goering got a trial. Even Eichmann got a trial. And then you have the nerve to call yourselves a "free country"? Wake up, people, put your shiny iPhones down.

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Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Read Kill Decision by timdearborn · 2013-09-20 06:54 · Score: 4, Insightful

If you have not read Kill Decision by Daniel Suarez, you should. This fictional thriller, written last year, unfortunately seems more like reality than fiction. It portrays a vivid, all-too-real picture of what could be the outcome of these policies. Wikipedia link to book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kill_Decision
Re:No.... by roc97007 · 2013-09-20 07:01 · Score: 3, Insightful

BANG!
You now have 5 seconds to comply. 4 3 2 1
Gotta love those mismanaged mutexes :)
It seems like some human police have already shifted to that algorithm.

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Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
they already exist by bitt3n · 2013-09-20 07:51 · Score: 4, Insightful

Killer robots have been used in combat for a long time. Their logic consists of "if pressure applied to unit, explode." Presumably these new models will be at least somewhat less likely to kill the wrong target.

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how many pairs of boxer shorts should you own?
Re:conscience by GameboyRMH · 2013-09-20 08:23 · Score: 3, Insightful

This is why the ruling class love killbots so much. A workable enforcement android will bring about the Oppression Singularity. No longer will they have to contend with "idealistic" cops and soldiers who don't blindly follow orders, whatever they may be, or worse yet leak their dirty laundry. No longer will they have to worry about who will "go soft" when the order comes in to fight their own people or take out a target of questionable status. No "untrustworthy" humans between the sociopaths and the rifles of their soldiers and no chance of them turning on their masters.

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"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Re:Cylons by rtb61 · 2013-09-20 18:48 · Score: 3, Insightful

The important question here is why autonomous killing machines, what benefit? The answer is likely to be very deeply disturbing. At a guess so military types and politicians can blame the supplier for murdering children, whilst continuing to send in the device's to terrorise the targeted populace in order to gain control of resources or just to spend money for no reason at all other than generating a profit from that spending.

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Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen