Do Killer Robots Already Exist?

his article contributes to a special symposium on science fiction and international law, examining the blurry lines between science and fiction in the policy discussions concerning the military use of lethal autonomous robots

Perhaps unsurprisingly, science fiction references infused media coverage of the original meeting in May, just as a stock photo of Terminators attacking dressed up news coverage of Angela Kane’s remarks last week. The Wall Street Journal’s headline about the Experts’ Meeting read “It’s Judgment Day for Killer Robots at the UN” and included a “Robocop” still. Reuters used a similar headline and went with an image from “The Terminator.” A few reports used pictures of Cylons. At Mashable, readers were told: “The UN [is battling] killer robots. Yes, the robopocalypse might be coming.”

@arthackday @StopTheRobotWar

“Firstly there's a real loss of control over the battlefield for commanders. Secondly, if a mistake is made there's a real problem with accountability."

Killer Robots: Keeping Control of Autonomous Weapons

The company says it will continue to work with its military clients, but has “vouched to not manufacture weaponized robots that remove humans from the loop” as it “has chosen to value our ethics over potential future revenue.” Stop Killer Robots Canada has welcomed the statement by Clearpath Robotics, which it said “has set the ethical standard for robotics companies around the world.”

"It's no longer a flight of fantasy, it's something that people should start taking seriously. But at the same time, it's not too late. Had we waited until we started seeing these enter battlefields worldwide, we think that it would be much harder to get this sort of dialogue going and realistically have a chance of stopping this technology from proliferating,"

These robots are our golems — utterly unpredictable, entirely unaccountable, alarmingly enabling. The horizon of war reeks of their casualties, with every blue face, every lank arm, the output of an arbitrary machine.

Every time it kills civilians, we add to guilt, like a bank account. And as time passes, guilt decays and reduces in value (especially if the robot kills bad guys). Now here's the governor bit: whenever guilt is above a value -- say, 100 -- then the robot formulaically becomes less willing to shoot.