August 22, 2017

Sorry, Banning 'Killer Robots' Just Isn't Practical

Featuring: Gregory C. Allen

Source: Wired

Journalist: Tom Simonite

LATE SUNDAY, 116 entrepreneurs, including Elon Musk, released a letter to the United Nations warning of the dangerous “Pandora’s Box” presented by weapons that make their own decisions about when to kill. Publications including The Guardian and The Washington Post ran headlines saying Musk and his cosigners had called for a “ban” on “killer robots.”

Those headlines were misleading. The letter doesn’t explicitly call for a ban, although one of the organizers has suggested it does. Rather, it offers technical advice to a UN committee on autonomous weapons formed in December. The group’s warning that autonomous machines “can be weapons of terror” makes sense. But trying to ban them outright is probably a waste of time.

Read the full article here.

Author

  • Gregory C. Allen

    Former Adjunct Senior Fellow, Technology and National Security Program

    Gregory C. Allen is a former Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) Technology and National Security Program. Mr. Allen focuses on the intersec...