Autonomic war robots..

www.naturalnews.com...

From article:

An artificial intelligence professor has warned that the trend toward creating autonomous killer robots for battlefield use poses "a threat to humanity."

Noel Sharkey of the University of Sheffield said that military leaders in several countries "are quite clear that they want autonomous robots as soon as possible, because they are more cost-effective and give a risk-free war."

Unmanned surveillance aircraft have been used for years and are currently deployed by the U.S. military in Iraq, along with 4,000 military robots on the ground. Some of these robots are armed with large-caliber machine guns. Armed robot border guards are also used by South Korea and Israel, and other robots are in use by China, India, Russia and the United Kingdom.

To date, none of these machines are able to fire without a human pushing a button or pulling the trigger in some other deliberate way. But such robots are already under development, with the U.S. planning to invest $4 billion in research by 2010 and $24 billion by 2032.

Continued in article.
This sounds very scary


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[edit on 22-8-2008 by Jbird]

I'm pretty sure that the engineers and scientists developing such things would also be smart enough to make some failsafe thing so it wouldn't "turn on us". If they're smart enough to develop these things I'm sure they'd be smart enough to protect us from all the "killer robots" as seen in movies and such.

Saw this video a few years back, still gives me the creeps:

So if they want a victimless war, why do they want to destroy the earth with machines? A victlmless war would be like deciding the fate of the world on WoW. So why not have a war where no one gets hurt and no resources are destroyed. In the middle ages if two lords didnt want to resort to battle, they would play chess. Lets do victimless war, lets fight the Middle East's armies on WoW.

They dont want a victimless war, whoever "They" happen to be. They want to kill the other people without losing any of their own. If none of our people die, then ignorant tax-payers, as a majority, wont care enough about thousands upon thousands of the OTHER people being murdered, even if it is for no reason. At least not enough to actively stop it. But maybe just enough to complain about it, kinda like we do today.

Well then, I suppose it is more a matter of just saving money then. They want to kill people in the most cost-effective manner possible. Pretty depraved if you ask me.

I still think world Leaders should be fit enough to go at it in a boxing ring if they decide to go to war or settle a score. I would love to at it with Cheyney hand to hand. He may be old, but I bet his evil ass can throw down. Probably not quick enough though to take on a yungin like me though, would not be fair.

reply to post by pluckynoonez


that did wonders for my imagination. Thanks for sharing

but
what we need are some plasma weapons...legit lightsabers and plasma rifles...

Robots knowledge extends only to what you allow it to. If you teach it to kill, it will. But be ready when it comes back to kill you. Before we make robots we should take a look at whether we are responcible enough to make artificial life. We aren't responcible enough to run ourselves why should we be able to create other types of life?

I think its a bad idea until we can grasp what making a new lifeform means.

Pluckynoonez that video of the robot definately was creepy. They could atleast make them alot smaller then us humans lol.
I dont think this is any different then hand robots they use in surgery etc. Except that these one will be a mirror to our form and be more likely to kill you.

This is a very interesting warning considering that the US military intend on placing up to 30% of combat operation into the "hands" of robots. Here's an article on the matter:

www.sciencedaily.com...

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www.abovetopsecret.com...

This thread goes far into explaining what some think may be the future of biological evolution...Into what they call a post-biological existence, where synthetic and organic have been perfected to the point where we shed the Orga in favor of the longevity of the Mecha.

I think part of this will have to be a period of where we and machines can find an equal niche in which we can coexist without conflict, eventually intermingling and altering the path of human evolution forever. I doubt such a road will be easy, and conflict can be considered a certainty.


[edit on 18-8-2008 by projectvxn]

If it comes to that point then i definately hope the Christians are right with the wrath coming. Dont think i can handle being dictated by sometthing humans created.

First, i agree with posters that say that war-robots are a possible direct threat. But i want to present a different angle to the problem, also worrying. Leaders always took in the consideration that their "subjects"/citizens could be needed to fight for them. Thus population should not be oppressed to the degree they will not fight for leaders or even join their enemies. Army was and is made of members of society. Now once armies will be "manned" with robots this need for willing manpower will be lost. And it will change the way common people are to be treated. To me it is even more troubling then a chance that robots will go crazy.

Well, once we reach the Singularity, it may not be up to us one way or the other. We have start thinking about Robot Rights. And here's why:

Let's say you buy a robot that does all the house and yard work for you and can keep up a conversation. It has an AI engine and it can learn exponentially faster then you can even understand.

Lets say you want a new model, what happens then? What if this robot doesn't want to be shut down? What if this machine has awakened to the quality of it's own existence and henceforth wishes to preserve that?

What do you think will happen? Conflict. Maybe not a huge war, but conflict that could very well lead to that. I say that we should treat basic robots as products, and A.I. as a life we bring into this world, much like a baby. With rights and privileges afforded to them based on their needs as artificial organisms.

Originally posted by Kigga
I'm pretty sure that the engineers and scientists developing such things would also be smart enough to make some failsafe thing so it wouldn't "turn on us". If they're smart enough to develop these things I'm sure they'd be smart enough to protect us from all the "killer robots" as seen in movies and such.

robots are easy to fool and trick...a bumblebee is smarter then any robot ever invented or to be invented...

War is indeed a horrible thing, and a very hard topic to discuss without offending a particular side. On one hand it's good because none of the home countries (wherever you call home) people will die, but on the other hand it has potential to turn war in to something that is only a matter of having enough resources to make another robot. It runs the risk of becoming even more immoral than it already is.

As far as 100% autonomous killer robots go, I don't think it's very likely. Any programmer with half a brain would realize that it would only be a matter of time before it gets back to you. How would a robot identify the wrong doer without a human controller? Face/fingerprints/voice etc. recognition allows to identify only a specific person. Super smell lets them recognize people with explosives and whatnot, but anyone in a war will have that smell on them regardless of their side. You could put RF emitters in the gear of a soldier, but what if they're captured or the signal emitter turns off? What if they get disfigured and the robot can't recognize the face of an innocent?

As you can see, there are a lot of questions to ask about the field of robots in war. They probably won't get overly autonomous, in my opinion, for some of the reasons listed above. Humans still make mistakes. Many of my fellow countrymen, people from my own province even, have been killed by friendly fire from Americans. Sometimes robots are better at understanding signals, but it's not something that should be relied on.

The best outcome is when both humans and technology work together in conglomeration. Just hope that the person behind the trigger is sane.

All of this is only my opinion on the matter, though. I've read about some amazing things in other fields of science lately, and perhaps I shouldn't underestimate the world of robot AI. We'll just have to keep our eyes peeled on legitimate news websites and in the scientific journals.

[edit on 18-8-2008 by OnionCloud]

never heard of a legitimate news website and legit scientific journals except what they teach you in school to believe is legit.

Anyhow dont see im in favour of it or war at all. Just means we wont see an end to them.

Originally posted by meadowfairy
never heard of a legitimate news website and legit scientific journals except what they teach you in school to believe is legit.

You aren't looking hard enough, then.

reply to post by OnionCloud


yes, there is a large ammount of data about AI and Robotics out there. About robots - I guess they are the future indeed as they can be manufactured.. by robots! Swarm Robot intelligence is now the "hot" topic in the field as you can have hundreds of robots working together as one single entity. I guess that by 2050 the battels will be carried fully by robots, with very little human supervision. Bit like the car facotries in Japan but of course more advanced..

Robots fighting wars for nations would be pointless, like somebody posted earlier that instead of wars, why not decide conflict on chess, boxing or a football match.

The reason why we don't is because in war people must be sacrificed they must fight for our nation. In war people must die so that it is a significant event both sides must have losses.

These Robot wars would have no significance because nobody died just that these machines blew each other up. What if one nations robots defeat the others are these robots going to massacre civilians taking no losses. It is no different to dropping a nuke because you destroy your enemy having no losses yourself. Making it a genocide.

well, i guess it will not be like Chess. In Chess, both players will start with the same ammount of "tools" and same positions. With Robots will be different, who own the best robots will win! UK plans to also have 1-3 robots for every soldier, before 2030 ! Japan could have the most advanced ones. The greatest challenge will be to use Evolutive Computing so that you can create programs to evolve the robots beyond the human capability of design..