{"id":4819,"date":"2008-02-27T10:38:41","date_gmt":"2008-02-27T10:38:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html"},"modified":"2008-02-27T10:38:41","modified_gmt":"2008-02-27T10:38:41","slug":"as-anyone-who-has-watched","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html","title":{"rendered":"Expert warns that killer robots are a “threat to humanity”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Well, yeah. As anyone who has watched the “Terminator” movies and TV program know, we run the risk of giving over too much control to the robots<\/a>. Never take your hand from their off switch \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

\tIncreasingly autonomous, gun-totting robots developed for warfare could easily fall into the hands of terrorists and may one day unleash a robot arms race, a top expert on artificial intelligence told AFP.
\n“They pose a threat to humanity,” said University of Sheffield professor Noel Sharkey ahead of a keynote address Wednesday before Britain’s Royal United Services Institute.
\nIntelligent machines deployed on battlefields around the world — from mobile grenade launchers to rocket-firing drones — can already identify and lock onto targets without human help.
\nThere are more than 4,000 US military robots on the ground in Iraq, as well as unmanned aircraft that have clocked hundreds of thousands of flight hours.
\nThe first three armed combat robots fitted with large-caliber machine guns deployed to Iraq last summer, manufactured by US arms maker Foster-Miller, proved so successful that 80 more are on order, said Sharkey.
\nBut up to now, a human hand has always been required to push the button or pull the trigger.
\nIt we are not careful, he said, that could change.
\n[…]
\n“I have worked in artificial intelligence for decades, and the idea of a robot making decisions about human termination terrifies me,” Sharkey said. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

BTW, the expert does make a valid point about using robots in a theater like Iraq where it might be hard to tell civilian from combatant.<\/p>\n

Teaching a computer-driven machine — even an intelligent one — how to distinguish between civilians and combatants, or how to gauge a proportional response as mandated by the Geneva Conventions, is simply beyond the reach of artificial intelligence today.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I don’t think machines will ever get to the point that they will be able to tell the difference, we can’t do it, how can they?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, yeah. As anyone who has watched the “Terminator” movies and TV program know, we run the risk of giving over too much control to the robots. Never take your hand from their off switch \ud83d\ude42 Increasingly autonomous, gun-totting robots developed for warfare could easily fall into the hands of terrorists and may one day…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":119,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[398],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology-2"],"yoast_head":"\nExpert warns that killer robots are a "threat to humanity" - Reformed Chicks Blabbing<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Expert warns that killer robots are a "threat to humanity" - Reformed Chicks Blabbing\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Well, yeah. As anyone who has watched the “Terminator” movies and TV program know, we run the risk of giving over too much control to the robots. Never take your hand from their off switch \ud83d\ude42 Increasingly autonomous, gun-totting robots developed for warfare could easily fall into the hands of terrorists and may one day…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Reformed Chicks Blabbing\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-02-27T10:38:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Susan Johnson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Expert warns that killer robots are a \"threat to humanity\" - Reformed Chicks Blabbing","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Expert warns that killer robots are a \"threat to humanity\" - Reformed Chicks Blabbing","og_description":"Well, yeah. As anyone who has watched the “Terminator” movies and TV program know, we run the risk of giving over too much control to the robots. Never take your hand from their off switch \ud83d\ude42 Increasingly autonomous, gun-totting robots developed for warfare could easily fall into the hands of terrorists and may one day…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html","og_site_name":"Reformed Chicks Blabbing","article_published_time":"2008-02-27T10:38:41+00:00","author":"Susan Johnson","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html","name":"Expert warns that killer robots are a \"threat to humanity\" - Reformed Chicks Blabbing","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-02-27T10:38:41+00:00","dateModified":"2008-02-27T10:38:41+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/#\/schema\/person\/b4e41455e911277a4681a65e81271065"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/2008\/02\/as-anyone-who-has-watched.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Expert warns that killer robots are a “threat to humanity”"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/","name":"Reformed Chicks Blabbing","description":"Politics and current events from a Reformed perspective, by Michele McGinty","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/#\/schema\/person\/b4e41455e911277a4681a65e81271065","name":"Susan Johnson","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/020\/02041661cf28a19369e083191c05c819x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/020\/02041661cf28a19369e083191c05c819x96.jpg","caption":"Susan Johnson"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/author\/sjohnson"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/119"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4819\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/reformedchicksblabbing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}