In the not-too-distant future, the U.S. military may turn more combat roles over to robotic soldiers, NPR reports.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) started robotics trials
last December with the ultimate goal of creating robots that can
perform advanced functions such as driving cars, manipulating everyday
objects, and having a free range of motion.
While the robots are being developed with the altruistic goal of
providing disaster relief, prominent roboticists are concerned that
advances in robotics sponsored by DARPA can be shifted to military use.
Roboticist Illah Nourbakhsh warned NPR:
If researchers set out to build a robot
that can drive a regular car, climb a ladder and operate a jack hammer,
"That means that that robot can manipulate an AK-47. That means that
robot can manipulate the controls of all the conventional military
machines as well," he says.
The overall concern with the gradual shift towards replacing soldiers
with autonomous robots, which Nourbakhsh believes is a likely outcome,
is who will be held accountable for the robots' actions.
There is also a very real concern that if wars are waged by robots,
humans may become more comfortable with the thought of killing.
Former U.S. commander General Stanley McChrystal told BBC's Today Program,
"There’s a danger that something that feels easy to do and without risk
to yourself, almost antiseptic to the person shooting, doesn’t feel
that way at the point of impact."
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