China's Brightest Children Are Being Recruited To Develop AI 'Killer Bots' (scmp.com)

According to The South China Morning Post, "some of China's smartest students have been recruited straight from high school to begin training as the world's youngest AI weapons scientists." A total of 27 boys and four girls all under the age of 18 were chosen for the four-year "experimental program for intelligent weapons systems" at the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) from more than 5,000 candidates. From the report: The BIT is one of the country's top weapons research institutes, and the launch of the new program is evidence of the weight it places on the development of AI technology for military use. "These kids are all exceptionally bright, but being bright is not enough," said a BIT professor who was involved in the screening process but asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the subject. "We are looking for other qualities such as creative thinking, willingness to fight, a persistence when facing challenges," he said. "A passion for developing new weapons is a must ... and they must also be patriots."

Each student will be mentored by two senior weapons scientists, one from an academic background and the other from the defense industry, according to the program's brochure. After completing a short program of course work in the first semester, the students will be asked to choose a speciality field, such as mechanical engineering, electronics or overall weapon design. They will then be assigned to a relevant defense laboratory where they will be able to develop their skills through hands-on experience.

Comments

Re:Many AI Killer Bots or 1 Atom Boi

[ShanghaiBill]

China obviously wants war. Why else would they put their country right next to so many American military bases?

Re:Many AI Killer Bots or 1 Atom Boi

[Joe_Dragon]

also the china owned land / Companys in usa will be lost to china as soon as the war starts.

Gaps

[Anonymous Coward]

Mr President, we must not allow a killer bot gap!

Re:Proof that China is sexist

[Gravis Zero]

I hope you understand, that "pretending to be an asshole on the internet" just means you actually are an asshole.

If I was a member of the ruling class

[rsilvergun]

automated kill bots would be my #1 priority. Throughout history the one thing that has consistently challenged my rule has been the military I use to keep power. Specifically charismatic leaders I needed to whip the troops into the kind of frenzy they need to die for me.

Kill bots let me do away that problem. Now all I need is a couple of geeky engineers to run my military and oppress everybody else. Mix in automated factories for making my stuff and I don't even need consumers. I can just own everything and use the ownership to decide who lives and who dies, giving me ultimate power.

And as a member of the ruling class, what else is there for me?

Re:If I was a member of the ruling class

[SqueakyMouse]

That doesn't sound like ultimate power to me. That sounds like a scenario in which the geeky engineers can overthrow you. They do run the military after all.

Re:sounds a little like the hitler youth is war co

[Nutria]

Selective abortion.

I hope they feel more secure... ???

[wolfheart111]

I love China,I wish we could cooperate better. :(

Small step

[religionofpeas]

Once you have AI killer bots to defend the homeland, it's only a small step to use them to keep your own population in check.

Re:We need to catch up

[jma05]

You may be right about the exponential tech-up.

But why do you think China will be the same after that? Today's China is nothing like Mao's China or the Imperial China from before that. It continues to change. Tomorrow's well-educated Chinese will ask for even more changes in their society.

US today is not like the US from 100 years ago. And tomorrow's China will not be today's China.

I am not worried about the Chinese. They are a practical people and mean well. I am only impressed about all the fresh-off-the-boat Chinese in US. They have all been humble, polite, gifted and hard-working.

Every dominant culture in history made its own mistakes imprinting itself on the world. The Chinese may too. But that's OK.

Re:he is an ass but he has a slight point

[west]

I'll agree that inequality of outcome is not evidence of discrimination, per se. However, given the way that the human brain over-generalizes patterns, I can pretty much guarantee that in any situation where there might naturally be inequality of outcome, there is almost certainly discrimination taking place as our brains try to eliminate the "anamolous" minority that our brain is desperately trying to "prove" don't belong.

We structure society to eliminate the minority; our brains constantly tell us that this person doesn't belong and that its a mistake they're here. Heck, the brain of the person themselves is constantly telling them they don't belong. All because brain structures designed to meet the needs of hominids a few million years ago don't to well with nuance, constantly whispering "one of these things just doesn't belong".

Our brains are simply not wired to handle reality. The idea that bell curves with different means overlap is difficult to understand for the majority of humans, and even harder to hold on to in daily life.

So, given the discrimination a minority is going to face due to the way our brains handle information, pushing another meme to disrupt the incorrect heuristic seems over-all welfare increasing. My guess is in a situation where a natural outcome is 80/20, human beings will structure their society and behaviour to make it 95/5 (if not 100/0), and pushing back with a meme of equality of outcome meme might make it 90/10.

Re:Proof that China is sexist

[DNS-and-BIND]

Truth tellers are seldom popular. The concept of "don't say vicious things" is a fine theory. In practice, as we have discovered over the last 10-20 years, if you let the hearer/reader decide what is vicious, suddenly, everything that everyone says is vicious. This is what our ancestors knew that we have mostly forgotten - that once you embrace the idea that it is legitimate for offensive speech to be constrained by force, the free-thinking world descends into endless multilateral outrage.

I believe that you love justice and truth and cooperation. You cannot have those things in a world where anything-that-anyone-defines-as-hate-speech is forcibly restricted. You either have to accept that the skinheads are going to get their chance to speak, or accept that you'll never be able to speak freely on any subject ever again.

This.

[rsilvergun]

Geeks don't have the same craving for power that a Generalissimo has. They also lack the Charisma to get any support, and one geek on his own can't maintain an army of kill bots. At least not yet.