/ News
Robots: do we want to give them a licence to kill?
The UN is discussing whether 'fully autonomous weapons’ – battle robots – should be allowed. Tom Chivers separates fact from fiction.
Every discussion of robots and warfare will always come back to one, or both, of two science fiction touchstones: Skynet and Asimov.
“Skynet”, the artificial intelligence defence system described in the Terminator films, gains self-awareness and immediately attempts to wipe out humanity. In Isaac Asimov’s robot stories, he imagines “three laws of robotics”, the first of which instructed all robots: “A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm”. Those are the options, popularly understood: robot murderers trying to destroy mankind; or pacifistic automatons barred by their programming from hurting humans at all.
If a group of activists with the splendid name “The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots” is to be believed, we are now at a watershed: a decision point, at which we can choose between, crudely speaking, a version of one or other of these two futures.
In Geneva, this week, representatives of 117 nations have been addressing a United Nations committee, to discuss the use of “fully autonomous weapons”: battle robots, to you and me. It isn’t all that long ago that this would have been a matter for science fiction, just as the Terminator is, but in recent years it has become an increasingly imminent concern.
The use of drones, or “unmanned combat air vehicles” (UCAVs), in warfare and assassinations has become widespread, if controversial. Two dozen countries are known or believed to use armed unmanned aircraft of varying degrees of sophistication. Britain and America use heavily armed, high-flying drones such as the MQ-9 Predator, which can stay in the air for 14 hours at a time while carrying more than half a ton of laser-guided bombs and missiles; since Barack Obama became president, one US senator estimates, more than 4,000 people have been killed in American military drone strikes.
The drones, however, have human pilots – often sitting thousands of miles away, using joypads and screens as though they were playing computer games, but nonetheless exercising direct control over the weapons they unleash. Last week, the Northrop Grumman X-47B began a new round of naval testing. While usually piloted by humans, it can fly entirely without human input, and earlier this year became the first automated aircraft to land on an aircraft carrier – which is tricky enough to do for ordinary, manned aircraft.
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Source: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/tomchiversscience/100245993/robots-do-we-want-to-give-them-a-licence-to-kill/
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Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.
The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies.
The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.
A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.
The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.
An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.
Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society
2015-2020
The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.
2020-2025
Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning bodily life. Such technologies will greatly enlarge the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make all kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.
2030-2035
Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence, expand human capabilities and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times. The final result at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.
2045
This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive! Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.
Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots will become affordable and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however: humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover, prerequisites for a large-scale expansion into outer space will be created as well.
Key elements of the project in the future
• International social movement
• social network immortal.me
• charitable foundation "Global Future 2045" (Foundation 2045)
• scientific research centre "Immortality"
• business incubator
• University of "Immortality"
• annual award for contribution to the realization of the project of "Immortality”.
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