Archive | March, 2013

Moral Machines Guru takes moral high ground on autonomous weapons

Posted on 09 March 2013 by nsharkey

Wendell Wallach is well known for co-authoring the important book ‘Moral Machines’ with Colin Allen. It presents the best state of the art description and discussion of how computers could or might make moral decisions about humans in the future. Now Wendell has come out strongly against the whole notion of autonomous weapons. He sees […] Continue Reading

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Robot warriors: Lethal machines coming of age

Posted on 06 March 2013 by nsharkey

The BBC News Magazine published an article that pits Nobel Peace Laureate Jody Williams and Peter “Wired for War” Singer against Henric Christensen and Ron Arkin from Georgia Institute of Technology. Henrick Christensen’s project funded by defence contractor BAE systems is used as an example of how autonomous robots may be used in conflict. The […] Continue Reading

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Killer robots must be stopped, say campaigners

Posted on 06 March 2013 by nsharkey

The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots was announced by Tracy McVeigh in the Sunday Newspaper the Observer on 24th February. This has created large positive media interest ahead of our the campaign to be launched in April this year. From the Observer: “Killer robots must be stopped, say campaigners A new global campaign to persuade […] Continue Reading

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The rational approach to the inhumanity of automating death by machines

Posted on 06 March 2013 by nsharkey

Three days after the publication of the Human Rights Watch Report: Losing our Humanity: The case against killer robots, the US Department of Defence issued a directive that gave clearance for the development of autonomous weapons: weapons that once launched can select and engage targets without further intervention. Here is my response on the relationship […] Continue Reading

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Drone race will ultimately lead to a sanitised factory of slaughter

Posted on 06 March 2013 by nsharkey

This is a link to an article that I wrote for the Guardian Newspaper in August 2012 which I think is becoming more relevant as we progress towards a campaign to stop killer robots. It describes the progression from current drone technology to the new fully autonomous weapons that are described in the Human Rights […] Continue Reading

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