Warbot Ethics
By Brian M. Michelson
May 22, 2017
Derek Bacon/The Economist
A Framework for Autonomy and Accountability
Rapid improvements in robotic technologies are presenting both civilian policy makers and military leaders with uncomfortable ethical choices. The pace of change is even quicker than many imagine: California recently issued its 30th corporate permit to test autonomous vehicles on public roads.[1] Emerging artificial intelligence (AI) technologies offers impressive gains in military effectiveness, yet how do we balance their use with accountability for inevitable errors? Considering the history of major technological and conceptual advances, many of these tensions and choices are neither new, unique, nor conceptually unapproachable. The choices fall broadly into three categories: How much autonomy do we provide to autonomous weapons to maximize their military effectiveness? Who makes that decision? And perhaps most critically, who is held accountable when something inevitably goes wrong? Fortunately, current military thought, doctrine, and regulations already provide an effective and adaptable conceptual framework for these challenges.
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