The United States should allow the use or development of autonomous weapons powered by artificial intelligence (AI) software, said a government-appointed panel in a draft report for the Congress. The panel led by the former Google CEO Eric Schmidt on January 26 concluded after two days of public discussion about how one of the world’s biggest military superpower should consider AI for national security as well as for elevating technology.
Its vice-chairman, Robert Work, a former deputy secretary of defence cited fewer chances of mistakes by autonomous weapons as compared to humans, to stop its ban in the military. Thus, according to him, it would prevent deaths or other mishappenings caused by the misidentification of the target. He termed it as a “moral imperative to at least pursue this hypothesis”. However, this discussion came against the controversial frontier of human rights and warfare.
“The hypothesis to be proven is that AI will improve target identification, which should improve and reduce the number of collateral damage and fratricide,” said Bob Work, NSCAI Vice-Chair.
“It is a moral imperative to pursue this hypothesis because autonomous systems will not be indiscriminate unless designed that way,” he added.
“The U.S. and the #UN have said indiscriminate weapons are not consistent with #IHL.” – Bob Work, #NSCAI Vice Chair
— National Security Commission on AI (@AiCommission) January 25, 2021
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Non-governmental organisations call for banning ‘killer robots’
US push to allow AI in the military came as nearly for eight years, a coalition of non-governmental organisations campaigned for banning “killer robots”. According to the coalition, human judgement is essential to carry the attacks and assigning blame for war crimes. Moreover, at least 30 countries including Brazil and Pakistan have supported the ban with the United Nations (UN) body holding meetings on the same since 2014.
UN chief Antonio Guterres has also backed the ban and has said, “Imagine the consequences of an autonomous system that could, by itself, target and attack human beings. I call upon States to ban these weapons, which are politically unacceptable and morally repugnant.”
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However, the US panel called the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence, in the meetings acknowledged the risks of autonomous weapons but concluded that it is still essential. As per the report, a member from Microsoft warned of pressure to build the systems that react quickly, that can risk further escalation of battle.
The panel proposed only humans to make the decisions of launching the nuclear warheads. Still, the panel proposed anti-proliferation work to a treaty banning the AI systems which according to NSCAI goes against America’s interests and is difficult to enforce. Meanwhile, Mary Wareham, the coordinator of the eight-year Campaign to Stop Killer Robots said that the commission’s focus on the need to compete with the similar advancements made by Chinese and Russian military “only serves to encourage arms races”.
But, NSCAI Commissioner, Jason Matheny said, “We recommend Congress establish a government-sponsored but externally-managed centre of excellence for research security — probably at a university-affiliated research centre.”
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