U.N. FAILS TO REACH AGREEMENT ON LAWS (LETHAL AUTONOMOUS WEAPONS)
I am not the least bit surprised. Very disappointed, but certainly not surprised. Here at IA we are first and foremost a artificial intelligence and machine learning organization that focuses on robotics and also on art. We don’t focus on war or weapons for that matter – but we do understand that technology plays not only an important and crucial role in the world of warfare but is also an integral part of the solution to this very problem.
The Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons which has 125 parties has been discussing possible limits on the use of lethal autonomous weapons, or LAWS, which are fully machine-operated and use new technology such as artificial intelligence and facial recognition.
The purpose of the Convention is to ban or restrict the use of specific types of weapons that are considered to cause unnecessary or unjustifiable suffering to combatants or to affect civilians indiscriminately.
Undoubtedly, there must be a ton of peoples mouths salivating at the fact that this is good for business. Namely the AI, Machine Learning, Support Vector Machine and Automated Weapons industries. God forbid that anyone take advantage of such a touchy issue.
Needless to say, the fact is that anything to do with War is big business. This does not make it right, and this does not make it wrong. However it does add fuel to an already smoldering fire.
Terms such as “Specialist in Human Rights”, “The Black Box Problem” and “Unfair Technological Advantages”. What do these terms mean for most? Let’s look at each one a bit more closely. Now, I’m not the type of person to use technical jargon or technical terms where they are not absolutely necessary – so forgive me for my layman approach to some of the subject matter. I ‘m trying not to over complicate things and my goal is to make this a 5 minutes or so read while staying as close as possible to the crucial points.
- Specialist in Human Rights – To me this is any person over 5 years of age and perhaps 3. I don’t care how much research you have done, I don’t care how many degrees you have in psychology, child behavior or social civil engineering. You are no more a specialist than any other human on earth – so cut it the fuck out. You want to debate – bring it.
- The Black Box Problem – basically, this is saying that because we as humans cannot calculate as precisely as a machine (debatable) – we cannot ever hope to understand how a machine may or may not come to any conclusion with any problem that it is given. That is to say that the patterns are so indiscernible to fully grasp for a human being that we can’t find where a program or algorithm may have gone wrong. And how does this relate to liability, and the “laws of the land”(any land etc.)? Well, to put it bluntly, this is simply incorrect. Look, if you sell a program that does something bad; You are liable 100% not because you didn’t know what the hell you were doing when you wrote the program and decided which algorithm was the perfect fit for the sale – but because you sold a faulty product. Plain and simple. The fact that you have a “Black Box Problem” and are simply too stupid and lazy to fix it or you just outright put it to use in a negligent manner or even malicious manner – well it doesn’t take a lawyer to tell you that you are fully liable either of Malicious Intent or Negligence. And yes one is harder to prove than the other, but so goes life. I hope that answered the quandary for most; if you still don’t get it maybe shouldn’t work in high tech, ai, ml, or any other computer related profession and surely stay away from politics or public office positions. (I implore you). To me the “Black Box Problem” is a way to weasel out of having liability and creating the illusion of an Act Of God. I call bullshit.
- Unfair Technological Advantages – Now this one is interesting and to me this one is the only one discussed at the U.N. that truly merits any sort of debate. I say this because – let’s be honest here – all is fair in love and war. And enforcing this type of thing is tricky. But I believe there is a solution, and an easy one at that. I believe that any country or entity has a right to develop any weapon – be it biological, nuclear, munitions, cyber, technical etc. Provided that it is only for defense purposes only. And it should only be employed in the presence of an invasion in progress. This is a simple solution. Only for defense – I would imagine these are already the rules in place – the problem is enforcement. All countries are already connected via international treaties so communications between countries would not be an issue. Furthermore, we can all agree that any country not acting in good faith – would be punished by the body of countries involved – which would be the entire rest of the world – so no one country could ever act aggressively against another country unless it was purely for defensive measures. And also, the punishment would be implemented automatically and instantly – autonomously – by every country by placing sanctions, and cutting off all transactions, political, financial etc. By bringing all transactions to an immediate halt with any country breaking treaty – the rest of the world would insure compliance. Because that country would be isolated immediately. Also, being a country on planet earth should be enough to be a member of the U.N. automatically. So whether countries sign an agreement or not, they are members by default. One could also share technologies with other countries for the betterment of mankind. Ladies and Gentlemen in all governments of the world – the people of this planet are also it’s caregivers; a fact that seems to fall on deaf ears most of the time. Some of you folks need to clean out your ears. Progress stops for no one.
That’s it. It’s not complicated. I think the world is messed up not because it’s complicated, but because there are a couple of assholes in high ranking positions in the world. That is the problem. Being a racist, or an asshole are very closely related. They are not the same thing, although to be racist, you also have to be an asshole. And furthermore, I want to point out that being a racist is a mental health issue and the world really does suffer from much of this. And I would venture to guess that it is probably the single most human ailment problem in existence in the world today.
I mean guys, we either have a United Nations that Rules or we have a United Nations that Rules under duress. I believe a one world government is the answer. God Bless.
Thanks for listening,
thedriven
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