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'Don't Fear the Robopocalypse': the Case for Autonomous Weapons (thebulletin.org)
Lasrick shares "Don't fear the robopocalypse," an interview from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists with the former Army Ranger who led the team that established the U.S. Defense Department policy on autonomous weapons (and has written the upcoming book Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War). Paul Scharre makes the case for uninhabited vehicles, robot teammates, and maybe even an outer perimeter of robotic sentries (and, for mobile troops, "a cloud of air and ground robotic systems"). But he also argues that "In general, we should strive to keep humans involved in the lethal force decision-making process as much as is feasible. What exactly that looks like in practice, I honestly don't know."
So does that mean he thinks we'll eventually see the deployment of fully autonomous weapons in combat? I think it's very hard to imagine a world where you physically take the capacity out of the hands of rogue regimes... The technology is so ubiquitous that a reasonably competent programmer could build a crude autonomous weapon in their garage. The idea of putting some kind of nonproliferation regime in place that actually keeps the underlying technology out of the hands of people -- it just seems really naive and not very realistic. I think in that kind of world, you have to anticipate that there are, at a minimum, going to be uses by terrorists and rogue regimes. I think it's more of an open question whether we cross the threshold into a world where nation-states are using them on a large scale.
And if so, I think it's worth asking, what do we mean by"them"? What degree of autonomy? There are automated defensive systems that I would characterize as human-supervised autonomous weapons -- where a human is on the loop and supervising its operation -- in use by at least 30 countries today. They've been in use for decades and really seem to have not brought about the robopocalypse or anything. I'm not sure that those [systems] are particularly problematic. In fact, one could see them as being even more beneficial and valuable in an age when things like robot swarming and cooperative autonomy become more possible.
So does that mean he thinks we'll eventually see the deployment of fully autonomous weapons in combat? I think it's very hard to imagine a world where you physically take the capacity out of the hands of rogue regimes... The technology is so ubiquitous that a reasonably competent programmer could build a crude autonomous weapon in their garage. The idea of putting some kind of nonproliferation regime in place that actually keeps the underlying technology out of the hands of people -- it just seems really naive and not very realistic. I think in that kind of world, you have to anticipate that there are, at a minimum, going to be uses by terrorists and rogue regimes. I think it's more of an open question whether we cross the threshold into a world where nation-states are using them on a large scale.
And if so, I think it's worth asking, what do we mean by"them"? What degree of autonomy? There are automated defensive systems that I would characterize as human-supervised autonomous weapons -- where a human is on the loop and supervising its operation -- in use by at least 30 countries today. They've been in use for decades and really seem to have not brought about the robopocalypse or anything. I'm not sure that those [systems] are particularly problematic. In fact, one could see them as being even more beneficial and valuable in an age when things like robot swarming and cooperative autonomy become more possible.
Autonomous killing machines are a frankly horrific idea. In principle, machines should serve us, NEVER the other way around. On first principles alone the idea that a machine could determine who to kill and who not to kill is a chilling idea.
And in practice, its a terrible idea. Human soldiers already face baffling moral situations. Woman with child at checkpoint acting suspiciously. Maybe suicide bomber. But she has a child. To shoot or not to shoot. Thats the kind of thing guaranteed to give a marine a gnarly case of PTSD,if he choses wrong, and possibly also a dead mother and child (or conversely a dead platoon). But the possibiliy of a horrifically wrong choice means that Marine is going to deploy ever fragment of reason his brain can muster. . How the hell would we entrust such a monumental decision to a robot. Its "wrong" choice has no repercussions for it. If it kills an innocent mother, it doesnt care, its just a thing. If it opts for caution and it choses wrong, it still doesnt care, its already dead. Theres no incentive anywhere up the chain of command to get this right, because 'Well a robot chose badly, sorry not our fault!' is a get out of jail free to just let the bloody thing go robocop on a civilian population. We *morally* AND *practically* NEED humans in that decision loop, even if its just some guy in an air conditioned office and a VR headset.
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
If I was in a gunfight I might think twice about killing another human. But a bot? No hesitation whatsoever. I'd blast the motherfucker.
Sending bots just sounds like an expensive way to flush money down the toilet.
I think we have well and truly crossed the cost line now. trained soldiers are expensive. A deployed soldier can be upwards of half a million a year in costs. drones and bots can already be more cost effective in many situations, the cost benefits are only going to accelerate more rapidly from here, I would say a large portion of the military personnel is very much on the countdown to obsolescence.
Slaughterbots: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CO6M2HsoIA&t=
A deployed soldier can be upwards of half a million a year in costs.
[Citation needed]
It will be a lot safer for the public: no more cops who claim they are "under pressure" or "affraid" so they had to shoot first. A robot can afford to shoot last, only when fired uppon first.
As we all know, the enemy always follows the rules. Right on back to some dirty farmers hiding in the woods not following the British 'rules of war'.
The technology to build these things is not difficult. In the US a gun is easiest part of the puzzle. Toss in some OpenCV, webcam, a solenoid and you can have your own private sentry.
War has and will always be over either control of people of control over what people own. Both can be done much more efficiently with data. The war is already going on and not just the Russians who influence the elections. (legally or illegally) Also by the American, by companies and by anybody else.
And as always, the people losing most, be it their money or their freedom or both, are the common people.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
A deployed soldier can be upwards of half a million a year in costs.
[Citation needed]
In the land of $100 hammers and $1000 toilet seats, you really need proof of this? Give me a fucking break.
Yes, we need a citation, because the $500k number is total bullcrap. It is implausible that a deployed combat soldier, at the far end of a 10,000 mile supply chain, costs so little.
Here is a citation that the actual cost is $850k to $1.4 million per soldier per year.
War ain't cheap.
let hem battle it out on a deserted remote island, whoever's AI robot army is still standing in the end wins.
General Zaroff and the BattleBots? That's one hell of a mash-up. Cool band name.
ofcourse, then the question becomes, why not just run a computer simultation instead.
Telling the kids it's just a game will be the prescription to prevent PTSD. Let's just hope they don't talk to Ender Wiggin.
Given a choice, which would you rather have come to your village:
1. A carefully designed, programmed and tested robot
2. A squad of soldiers that haven't slept in two days or eaten in 18 hours, and who just medevaced a comrade who had his leg blown off below the knee by a booby trap
Are you really sure you want a human decision maker "in the loop"?
They even up the playing field, because muslims don't value life (even their own) and will send suicide bombers. .
Actually this is a very good point. Is it worse to build an unfeeling robot to fight, or to remove all human emotion and compassion from humans like Islam does with its vial belief system?
The US mil thinking is not that secret on how to win a war. The results wanted well understood.
The free fire zones over Vietnam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The British response in the Second Boer War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
But with robots.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Actually, that's conservative. CNN reports $850,000 to $1.4 million for US soldiers in Afghanistan.
I's be surprised if it was as cheap as half a million.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
Everyone seems to forget we've had fully autonomous lethal weapons for decades - they're called land mines and sea mines. All we've done is make them smarter and more mobile. Making them smarter should only help reduce the number of false-positive casualties. To some extent, the same basic rules apply to robots as minefields - the person culpable is the one who deploys them. We've just got more control now than we did before.
I really can't think of a reason why a military would not develop such weapons.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
If people aren't being killed, there is no point to war. When we have robots fighting robots, it is just a show.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
"a killing machine with unwavering loyalty and a complete absence of conscious"
That's not the problem.
If you, a civilian police officer, are faced with a terrorist attack by a semi-autonomous robotic rifle, trigger being pulled at maximum rate (or a bump stock being part of the mechanism), immune to small arms fire, able to target accurately out to 100 yards, and able to negotiate stairs and open doors, what do you do, wait for the military to respond?
Such devices are well within reach of determined and moderately funded groups. Remotely guided devices seem simpler. Change the weapon to a pistol and put it on a hefty drone and you have air cover and the death toll is tripled, mostly first responders.
It's not the lack of conscience of the devices, it's the lack of conscience of the criminals building and deploying them. We face enemies that have a different conscience than we do, one incompatible with our typical morals. THAT is the problem. They will build and use weapons of unacceptable, unimaginable brutality and efficiency, all to achieve their goals.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Not the current crap.
Autonomous killing machines are a frankly horrific idea.
Agreed. But the alternative, remote controlled killing machines, seems to be just as bad. We have already seen from leaked videos that soldiers given drones to pilot using a video feed seem to treat bombing people as some sort of fancy computer game.
Given the two options I am not sure which is worse. An emotionless killing machine that follows preset rules of when, and when not, to engage or an emotional human who follows no predetermined patterns but one so removed that they regard your life as much as they value the life of a video game character.
Unlike like a growing number of countries, the US hasn't yet agreed to a ban on use of land mines.
These (simple) machines can automatically indiscriminately kill, with essentially no protection against civilian deaths, and
can remain active for many many years.
Anyone could make your same argument against our police. Have you watched a sci-fi movie recently? There's plenty of them demonstrating how brutal the once good guys could become once they have incredible power and little at risk. Throw in unwavering loyalty and you've got the evil Empire from Star Wars.
Think globally but act within local variable scope.
I think we have well and truly crossed the cost line now. trained soldiers are expensive.
I think the greatest concern with autonomous weapons is they can entirely change the rules of the game re. asymmetric warfare.
Autonomous large-scale-deployable indiscriminate weapons can be just a less-efficient form of other WMDs such as Chemical Weapons, which are also banned.
Imagine a country deploys 10000 killer drones over a small county to spread panic and fear.
If the assailant has autonomous weapons in sufficient number that can effectively target and kill any human before they can so as much get a shot:
traditional ground troops cannot counteract these kinds of attackers, and 10000 drones with say 1000 bullets each and a perfect shot every time = 10 Million dead humans, and no risk of loss of life in those conflicts to the attacker.
Yes.... Autonomous Weapons are going to happen: what needs to be banned internationally is the use of Indiscriminate Autonomous Weapons, especially Mobile indiscriminate weapons that can move a long distance on their own power or be deployed to a remote target, and the deployment of Autonomous Weapons designed to target humans even if unarmed in general or carry or release explosives.
Indiscriminate: Autonomous devices that you drop at a location that will immediately activate a targeted attack against any human or any animal that moves: regardless of whether the person is a threat or not.
We should be trying to actively develop Autonomous defenses against other weapons systems, and Autonomous devices that Monitor, Identify, share information about, and Destroy potential autonomous threats.
Sure. Different solution.
Glad my example is valid for other use cases.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
immune to small arms fire, able to target accurately out to 100 yards, and able to negotiate stairs and open doors, what do you do, wait for the military to respond?
You need a swarm of remote-controllable drones able to get within sufficient range of the offender and deploy an artificial EMP.
The real problem is how much more quickly an autonomous attacker can kill/hurt a lot of people with precision BEFORE a credible response could be launched, and the fact the terrorist might have the advantage of targetting the very location, people, or things they need to target in order to snuff out or delay response efforts.
So I say you need a partially autonomous automatic response with no single or centralized point subject to attack..... this suggests surrounding the public with fleets of surveillance drones whose purpose is to identify and alert on potential autonomous (or other) threats And upon a risky enough situation begin the response process on their own.
"You need a swarm of remote-controllable drones able to get within sufficient range of the offender and deploy an artificial EMP."
Collateral damage prohibits this.
"The real problem is how much more quickly an autonomous attacker can kill/hurt a lot of people with precision BEFORE a credible response could be launched, and the fact the terrorist might have the advantage of targetting the very location, people, or things they need to target in order to snuff out or delay response efforts."
Response time is the Achilles heel of counter-terrorism. True. However, imagine this hypothetical device surviving the initial response. The duration will increase substantially. So too the casualties. Evacuation would have to be a quick decision, and then possibly waiting the device out. A little imagination leads you to using an armored vehicle to take that out, if it's accessible, or a counter-robot and explosives, probably. Collateral damage. Bad situation.
"So I say you need a partially autonomous automatic response with no single or centralized point subject to attack..... this suggests surrounding the public with fleets of surveillance drones whose purpose is to identify and alert on potential autonomous (or other) threats And upon a risky enough situation begin the response process on their own."
"no single or centralized point subject to attack" - um, sorry, but a single target doesn't fit into this strategy as expressed. Worse, though you propose a standing fleet of drones ready to react. I doubt this is successful if the threat becomes an explosive. Too late. But a hit and run attack has your drones trying to identify the threat, which is still, despite being simple manufacture, able to shoot-and-scoot in an urban setting, spreading the damage, which will probably be the strategy as it evolves, and identifying the threat is the key step, If it dodges, you have a lot of problems, standing fleet or not.
We are within reach of a time where response is not enough. But prevention is out of reach, unless you tackle the root causes.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Good lord, you've made the best case for robots I've ever heard. A human being having to make a tough choice that can easily result in an innocent woman's death or his platoons, and said choice scaring him for life? Even if he makes it correctly? Holy hell man, protecting people from danger like that is why we build robots. Just offloading the decision to someone else can help prevent PTSD for the soldier on the ground. Robots can make of sensors at a range to get a better probability assessment it's a suicide bomber. Couple that with a robot that can approach the woman and get blown up and not mind (unlike a human soldier), therefore tweaking the cost of a false negative, and you have a far superior system.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
This cat is out of the bag. There's little point in debating the ethics of it. Once the technology exist, and it already does, it can and will be abused. No matter how many countries say "we won't do it" it will be done. We may as well have them because as sure as the the sun sets in the west someone else will.
I don't think the A/C poster is comfortable with words as complex as 'Basic'
'3 Laws Safe' is sounding more and more appealing.
Except we want war to be expensive. The cost is the only thing that keeps the warmongers in check. Or rather, it's the cost associated with protection and the fear of not being able to meet it, that keeps the warmongers in check. Huge expense is about the only thing that makes these psychopaths come to the negotiating table. Imagine what would happen if war was cheap. Rather than negotiate for mineral rights so that everyone benefits, you'd just have armed drones swoop in and kill anyone in the vicinity. Forget terrorism, you'd be more afraid of pissing off someone with access to the drone controls than someone with a bomb vest. Hell, even the police wouldn't be needed anymore, you commit a "crime" and you get visited by your friendly neighborhood T-1000.
A person who wants cheap war, is a person who believes that the lives of others are irrelevant. I've always thought that the creators of Skynet got exactly what they deserved for doing so. They tried to make war cheaper, and require less effort, but they went too far. They made it too cheap and made it so that it required no effort from themselves, and they paid the price first for their foolishness.
The recent drone attack on an army base has more or less convinced me that even non-state actors are finding automated weaponry a good choice. So costs can't be too much of a barrier.
OTOH, flexibility is still superior for the human. Most robots can only deal with a relatively small number of cases, and none are even approximately as good at self-repair. (But it's easier to replace parts...so that may be an even trade-off, except for costs.)
It strikes me as an extremely dangerous direction to head, but it also seems to be one that we are definitely headed in, because even if one group doesn't do it, another will.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
The argument that war being horrific will prevent it doesn't work very well historically. It's a bit better than "war is profitable", but that's a pretty low barrier.
To take your example, the middle ages is full of dukes/lords/kings leading armies back and forth across various battlefields until the area being fought over was so wrecked it couldn't support the people living there. That is often resulted in the duke/lord/king getting killed didn't stop things. It's not clear it slowed them down much. People tend to discount future dangers in favor of present gains.
Additionally consider the crowds at soccer games. They'd have a lot less chance of getting hurt if they didn't riot, but that doesn't reliably stop them.
So the available evidence seems to indicate that "war being horrific will keep it from happening" is a false claim. Much more likely is "War is unprofitable even in the short term.", so that's what we need to set up. But you still shouldn't expect perfection. The soccer fans don't have anything to gain, and they've got a lot to lose.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
It's not the lack of conscience of the devices, it's the lack of conscience of the criminals building and deploying them. We face enemies that have a different conscience than we do, one incompatible with our typical morals. THAT is the problem. They will build and use weapons of unacceptable, unimaginable brutality and efficiency, all to achieve their goals.
I'm not precisely disagreeing with you, but consider:
It's not the lack of conscience of the devices, it's the lack of conscience of the governments building and deploying them. We face enemies that have a different conscience than we do, one incompatible with our typical morals. THAT is the problem. They will build and use weapons of unacceptable, unimaginable brutality and efficiency, all to achieve their goals.
If our government not building these devices would prevent them from coming into existence, I'd be totally against them. Unfortunately...
I'm rather certain that these devices are going to become increasingly available, until some people will have them patrolling their houses. Laws against booby-traps will probably make them illegal, but that won't totally prevent them. Certainly some intruders will use variants of them to scope out the scene, and perhaps to conduct the intrusion without their presence. An automated burglar would probably be more difficult than an automated assassin, though.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
War is supposed to be horrific. That's a big incentive to prevent it.
America participates in more wars that any other country. As an American, if a particular war is too horrific, I can just close my browser tab for that conflict, and read about something else instead.
The problem is, the MAD solution was unstable even with three players. This is going to start off with dozens of players, so MAD is critically unstable even before the "game" has started.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
This does not surprise me at all, especially as the cost is arrived at by taking the total campaign cost divided by the number of soldiers.
Everything the US military does costs an eye-popping amount. The V22 Osprey costs $64000/hour to operate. The Bradley AFV cost over $50 for every mile driven. Recoilless rifle ammunition runs between $500 and $3000 per round. Every time an A10 opens up its mighty 3900/ round/minute cannon, each of those rounds costs $150.
The current administration's plans for increases in troop levels in Afghanistan are expected to cost the US taxpayer over a trillion dollars when all the downstream costs are included. In return they hope to secure access to about a trillion dollars in mineral reserves for US companies.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Anyone who has installed an alarm system into their home and has set it off accidentally -- should understand the main issue with arming your alarm system.
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
The current version of this stuff is already so cheap it's being used by non-state actors. There was a drone assault on an army base recently. The attackers did not identify themselves.
This stuff is coming. It may be unfortunate (probably is), but it's cheap enough and easy enough that primitive versions are already in use. So far they all depend on remote control, but simple versions that don't are easy...they just aren't as flexible. About all you need to add is a GPS starting point, an inertial guidance system, and a target.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Given a choice, which would you rather have come to your village:
1. A carefully designed, programmed and tested robot
2. A squad of soldiers that haven't slept in two days or eaten in 18 hours, and who just medevaced a comrade who had his leg blown off below the knee by a booby trap
Are you really sure you want a human decision maker "in the loop"?
1. A carefully designed, programmed (to kill all humans) and tested robot
Holy TOS Mr. Spock! No references to "A Taste of Armageddon" yet? What has this site come to?
'The tyrant will always find pretext for his tyranny.' - Aesop's Fables
for that terrifying thought. I never thought about us automating our military. The US army is the world's biggest social program. The Military Industrial Complex was thought up as a way to keep the US economy going in the face of crazy wealth inequality. I knew driving jobs are going away. I suspect all but the highest level IT jobs will go some day and eventually even coding jobs. But I forgot about the army. Man, are we in for a rough time with this second (third?) industrial revolution...
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How about neither? How about we stop meddling in everybody's country. We've got 7 wars going on ( Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, Libya and Syria) and we're working on #8 and 9 (DPRK & Iran). Meanwhile I'm up to my eyeballs in debt from college and the roads I drive on are falling apart.
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well I did explicitly say UPWARDS of 500k. 500k was the last official number I had seen. I would suspect even those cnn figures are dated now and costs would be well over the million a year per soldier.
I should have been clearer: it will bring the total cost for the war into the trillion dollar range, counting all downstream costs.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Nopenopenopenopenope
The millennial that doesn't like most of the stuff designed for millennials.
no way in hell is a soldier even when not deployed is only 300k a year. training, housing, equipment, transport all cost significant amounts and many of the deployment costs while less don't just return to zero as you need to have the equipment, personnel, IT etc to support those people whether they are actively being used or not.
That greatly depends on the overall strategy for the war.
1. To drain the opposition of support
or
2. To crush the opposition by force
The former is what most Americans in living history now know, like the Korean war, the Vietnam war, the Gulf war etc. and in that case it's true. You don't have rouge elements, you don't have soldiers on a power trip that rape, pillage and murder. You don't have soldiers who fear for their own lives and who'd rather cause incidental or accidental damage to civilians than risk getting shot and killed themselves. There's no more caskets of American servicemen being flown home and no more public outcry, all you have to do to play world police is pay for replacements.
That's not how you occupy a country. That's not how Nazi Germany crushed France. That's not how the Allies crushed Nazi Germany. That's not how the US made the Japanese surrender. It's basically saying we're going to pound you into the ground and keep pounding until you beg for mercy. If there's attacks or sabotage on our forces we'll retaliate ten times harder or just round up a bunch of civilians and shoot them. And if we want to do a little genocide or ethnic/religious cleansing that's what we'll do.
In that situations robots are the perfect psychopaths. They have no guilt or remorse, they don't feel the hate and anger, they don't care if they're despised and attacked, they don't desert or refuse to follow orders. They don't care if the targets are civilian or military, young or old, women and children. And you can say it's the same as a gun today, bullets don't care. The difference is that the guy pulling the trigger is 10000 miles away playing Counterstrike or maybe just playing a real world game of Civilization. City in riot? Send in the troops.
It would be nice fantasy if the atrocities of war happened because of the atrocities of war. But those manning the gas chambers of the Holocaust weren't hungry, tired, revengeful or full of PTSD. Neither have most invading generals throughout history been, they command and other people suffer and preferably the other side. Just because we take away the "burden" of fighting on the front lines doesn't mean those people will stop shuffling pieces on a chess board to win. In fact, they'd probably just find it easier if the pawns stop complaining.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
forget about combat.... ...these will be fantastic for robbing banks!
hypothetically speaking, of course!
chris watts íë¦ìS ì(TM)ì
The tragedy is that A/C's are genetically incapable of creating anything better or even equivalent. But I hope that this posting A/C may be the exception.
... Come on baby, don't fear the robopocalypse
Baby take my hand, don't fear the robopocalypse
We'll be able to fly, don't fear the robopocalypse
Baby I'm your man
- New Oyster Cult
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
Self-defense is likely the least common use case. I'm not concerned about that, but more about police use, where errors are so prevalent that elevating their capabilities will increase the lethality of mistakes/SWATing/overreaction, and the police are not yet held sufficiently accountable to discourage these.
Accountability isn't a uniquely police issue.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
emp is not even a real weapon yet.
people keep forgetting that.
actual EMP weapons (not created by a nuclear blast) are still in the realm of scifi.
if they were not our troops would be using them daily simply because of how dang useful theyd be in a fight.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
So drone warfare will make war less expensive so more people can participate? Yea, that sounds like a good idea. Let's do that.
http://www.pdfernhout.net/reco... "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? ... Likewise, even United States three-letter agencies like the NSA and the CIA, as well as their foreign counterparts, are becoming ironic institutions in many ways. Despite probably having more computing power per square foot than any other place in the world, they seem not to have thought much about the implications of all that computer power and organized information to transform the world into a place of abundance for all. Cheap computing makes possible just about cheap everything else, as does the ability to make better designs through shared computing. ... ..."
Nuclear weapons are ironic because they are about using space age systems to fight over oil and land. Why not just use advanced materials as found in nuclear missiles to make renewable energy sources (like windmills or solar panels) to replace oil, or why not use rocketry to move into space by building space habitats for more land?
Biological weapons like genetically-engineered plagues are ironic because they are about using advanced life-altering biotechnology to fight over which old-fashioned humans get to occupy the planet. Why not just use advanced biotech to let people pick their skin color, or to create living arkologies and agricultural abundance for everyone everywhere?
These militaristic socio-economic ironies would be hilarious if they were not so deadly serious.
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.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.