I, Robot , I Soldier.

[Retired Member southey]

To have a fully autonomous machine in charge of its own list of targets and able to readjust it's own parameters based on the importance of the target, be it a large mission objective or a single person is fundamentally wrong in my view. there should all ways be an accountable body in charge of the fire button, else you will start to lose the human empathic response from the battle field. i.e chaps roll in to a compound find the chap they are looking for, he is with his family, they arrest the whole lot to get the one man. machine rolls into a compound finds the chap with his family, his mission is kill or capture any way could it be that wrong for it to just interpret the family as accomplices and kill every one there? the machine completed its mission as charged and the loss of life is deplorable but its just a programming error that needs to be adjusted, this kind of action after a while is no longer an error but the norm, you hear the world is becoming a safer place, and start not to care about how it's happening as there are no more injured or dead soldiers for the news to report? I'm not saying this wouldn't happen with dudes on the ground just to say it could be an easy way to explain the way we become cool with mechanised executions in the name of peace.

 

[Sniper]

It's because of the horror and carnage of war with WWI being the most apt example that politicians and nations think twice before entering into a conflict, hence poppy day. The problem I feel is that the people responsible for sending us to war always stay in the comparitive safety of home ground. I believe that the likes of the Gulf war would not have happened if Bush & Blair had to be up at the front line, commanding. And I'm sure I'll get flack for this one, but that's the same reason that Maggie would have been first into Port Stanley with an SLR at her shoulder (with Dennis following behind with the tea tray). :borgsmile:AR15firin:BlueTeamE
:sad6:

 

[Biker]

And if you've not seen it before , this is what a very smart kid can do with a Laptop and a Paintball gun.
Extrapolate.

Scary stuff that, reminds me of the films Aliens and the auto guns in the tunnel.

Robots as such are already in use within the military, not your Terminator endoskeleton wandering about muttering "I'll be back" but in general usage both in offensive and defensive roles.
It's just a case of how sophisticated they are allowed to become. Already there are smart weapons that if captured and attempted to used against the army that had them can detect it and not work. I'm referring to ground to air missiles and such not handguns etc of course. A captured ground to air missile in the hands of the enemy and fired at an aircraft will detect the transponder signal given off by the friendly aircraft and either won't fire or just go astray after another non transpondered target.

How difficult this function is to bypass I don't know.

I had many a fascinating discussion with some US military personnel back in 1990 when my Uncle was in the US Army and based at the Post in Frankfurt. How far they've come on in the past 21 years makes me wonder.

But if a machine is given control of the trigger and decide the fate of an enemy. Well, for me that's just one step too far. Unless that automated sentry gun platform is so clever it can tell the difference between a lost child looking for a friendly face or that would be attacking soldier.

Let me close in saying I also agree with putting the politicians into the cage to fight it out. Bush has a lot to answer for. As do most of those in absolute power.

 

[TeeDee]

It's because of the horror and carnage of war with WWI being the most apt example that politicians and nations think twice before entering into a conflict, hence poppy day. The problem I feel is that the people responsible for sending us to war always stay in the comparitive safety of home ground. I believe that the likes of the Gulf war would not have happened if Bush & Blair had to be up at the front line, commanding. And I'm sure I'll get flack for this one, but that's the same reason that Maggie would have been first into Port Stanley with an SLR at her shoulder (with Dennis following behind with the tea tray). :borgsmile:AR15firin:BlueTeamE
:sad6:

I knew and worked with a guy that was one of the CPO's for Maggie for many Years, he simply described her as a 'one-off' in terms of her endurance and mental clarity.

 

[TeeDee]

Now in the same way that design of a Modern Combat Aircraft is hindered by the requirement for space and equipment to sustain either one or two people , aircraft can now travel faster than the Human body can tolerate in terms of G-force , the Human presence is now a encumberance , the Design of Remote controlled Drones are faster and give longer flight times with less fatigue etc etc.
Even with a human using remote controlled avionics , the Human Brain and reflex speed is still slowing down the efficiency and ability of the Drone. So there will be a watershed moment when the Modern Militaru nations will hand over the 'request to fire' to the Fuzzy logic of the AI imo.


Scary stuff.



< I just saw this on the BBC website, I wonder how much is automated. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12308437 >

 

[ged]

I dread to think how much that kid's paintballl setup would have cost me if the military had developed it. Yes, I know I've paid for it already.

Comparisons between the longbow, the Tomahawk and the ultimate autonomous ghetto blaster are just differences in form and scale and I can't get emotional about whether there is or there isn't a human behind the sights. I'm a bit more emotional about a human being in the sights, especially if it's one who never had any say in the issue -- that seems to be the majority just lately.

No matter how clever they are, I don't think weapons are a very good substitute for listening to each other. The problem is that we're pretty good at talking to each other, but generally our listening skills suck.

 

[demographic]

Can't be any thicker than squaddies...

Now where's that whistling innocently smilie?

 

[rik_uk3]

I suspect the days of the fighter pilot are soon to close, drones will rule the roost with some spotty oik flying one from the comfort of a base thousands of miles away and why not.

Plus things like

[video=youtube;3Ho4zowaaXI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ho4zowaaXI[/video]

 

[demographic]

I suspect the days of the fighter pilot are soon to close, drones will rule the roost with some spotty oik flying one from the comfort of a base thousands of miles away and why not.

Plus things like

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ho4zowaaXI

There's quite a few unmanned fighters on the horizon.

 

[TeeDee]

Bit in the News this morning.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/9470674.stm

 

[Tony]

interesting viewing, there's always going to be pro's and cons, it comes down to the ethics and integrity of those using the kit.

 

[_scorpio_]

But if someone wants to make a statement against a country they hate they will use suicide bombers and other kinds of explosives as we have seen, so the only people i can think of at the moment who would benefit from these weapons are the dictators of corrupt countries who want to kill protesters and rebel groups.

if war does turn into robots fighting robots, then surely it will become a battle of technology and hackers and eventually become pointless. there is no point sending a person to a problem if they are going to be killed by a bulletproof robot.
there will be no war, just conflicts ended with large devastating explosions.

could be the way forward though? person A has a problem with person B in politics/religion/whatever, so they play a billionaires game of robot wars, and its settled or they keep going until one country is out of robots, because there is no other way to do it without bombing innocent people, you cant send people because they will die.
could be pretty entertaining too... dictators robot wars...

i dont see a way of advancing past the three options of bomb them or big robot wars or shut up and be friends.

 

[TeeDee]

Ok , try scaling this back a little so people can feel it as tangible and realistic rather than a Terminator type scenario.

How would you feel about and AI Controlled UAV , Completely autonomous on the battlefield.

Now , same scenario , but Armed.

 

[tiger stacker]

Ok , try scaling this back a little so people can feel it as tangible and realistic rather than a Terminator type scenario.

How would you feel about and AI Controlled UAV , Completely autonomous on the battlefield.

Now , same scenario , but Armed.

The line between science fact n fiction is slowly blurring, give it a generation or two before the line becomes red with blood.

Gooners use UAVs
Felix have their life saving wheelbarrows.
The Cav utilising Panthers have joystick operated machine guns mounts.

One day a Aritifical brain will be given life or death paremeters, not in my lifetime though that is if there is any resources left to create sudden heart stoppers.

 

[Berk]

So long as future wars are scored on Style, Control, Damage and Aggression.

 

[TeeDee]

Just found this on the news , Robot Wardens for Korean prisons.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15893772

 

[Tengu]

The BBC have an anti robot agenda.

 

[RonW]

To be honest, it scares the living crap out of me.
We all know that machines of war will be used against humans and it is a very, very small step for someone to use them in the wrong way.
Especially large worldpowers with huge amounts of industrial capacity could construct an army and unleash that in any way the possibly see fit. Combine that with the knowledge on artificial intelligence we have now and will be having in a decade or so and we could have a very serious problem at hand.

 

[TeeDee]

We all know that machines of war will be used against humans and it is a very, very small step for someone to use them in the wrong way.

I think I know what you mean and I'm playing Devils Advocate in some way , but what would you state is the 'right' way for them to be used??

I guess I'm looking at this whole thing from a morality/humanity standpoint , is it ok to dispatch AI robots to fight a war for you???

 

[mountainm]

We "civilise" war as it befits a twisted moral code. No-one wants the horror of Nuclear, Chemical or Biological warfare, despite these being ultimately the most devastating weapons we could use in a field of war. The reason we don't use them is we don't want them used on us - so the world comes to an uneasy accord. Which weapons are civilised and which aren't. I'm certain eventually robots will be added to this list.

To illustrate my point. Take one war, now remove humans from the equation, introduce robots into the theatre of war and extrapolate. How do we judge the outcome? Causalities and occupied territory are usually pretty good indicators of success in battle - however in a fully mechanised war the actual protagonists could be thousands of miles away, playing a virtual but gruesome videogame - the robots fighting each other in an arena in which (has been already said) only the local civilians suffer. Extrapolate further and given we are removing the majority of humans from the occasion then perhaps we also remove the fragile yet inescapable humanity of war. It becomes virtualised, meaningless. We may as well just compare bank balances and declare the richest the winner.

EMP grenade anyone?