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Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

newscientist.com

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Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#111

Post by megapolitics »

blablabla123 wrote: post #44
RetroTechie wrote: post #12

Is this any different from say, carpet-bombing an area? If so, how?

> Carpet bombing of cities, towns, villages or other areas containing a concentration of protected civilians has been considered a war crime since 1977, through Article 51 of Additional Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpet_bombing Autonomous weapons have hardly been deployed yet, maybe at the Inner Korean border or some lunatic's backyard. Therefore I don't think there is any leg…

What relevance does your quote have here? The area in question has no civilians to speak of.

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#113

Post by elteto »

sebastiennight wrote: post #28
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #21

A few thoughts. First, I advise a modicum of skepticism to be retained in the face of such news. Ukraine is, after all, in the middle of an existential crisis and must take every advantage it can, even if it's just scaring Russian invaders further (I bet both Russian and Ukrainian soldiers are already pretty scared of drones). Additionally: "“There is no connection to the drone at all, you cannot see the video, nothi…

> They're fighting for their country's existence. I would use every weapon in my disposal; and I'm a pacifist who hates violence. I'm not sure it's accurate to define yourself as a pacifist if you believe safeguarding the concept of a nation-state is more important than human life, ethics, or the downstream effects of using "every weapon at your disposal". I don't think you realize the creativity and variety we human…

Being a pacifist doesn’t imply being a doormat. At any rate, I don’t think Ukraine would have attacked Russia under any credible circumstances.

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#114

Post by elteto »

holoduke wrote: post #80
inigyou wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're fighting for their own existence. Russia has killed, enslaved, and/or tortured most of the citizens of the regions it's already captured, and replaced them with ethnic Russians.

[flagged]

I don’t imagine you get paid by the FSB, so I gotta ask, do you really do this for free?

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#115

Post by victorbjorklund »

CrzyLngPwd wrote: post #112

I wonder what that means for war crimes responsibility. Let's say a swarm of these things kills every civilian patient in a hospital or every child in a school. Who is responsible? I'm surprised Israel wasn't the first to field such weapons.

Not any difference from sending a cruise missile into a hospital killing every patient or every child in a school. The people giving the order to press the button and the people pressing the button can be liable for war crimes (can be because killing civilians by accident isn’t necessarily a war crime or even having collateral civilian causalities).

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#116

Post by stephbook »

CrzyLngPwd wrote: post #112

I wonder what that means for war crimes responsibility. Let's say a swarm of these things kills every civilian patient in a hospital or every child in a school. Who is responsible? I'm surprised Israel wasn't the first to field such weapons.

Imagine sanctions killing a million civilians due to insufficient medical care. Imagine firebombing Tokyo. Imagine dropping a nuclear bomb on a city full of civilians. Imagine genociding Palestinians. Imagine bombing a girl's school, killing hundreds.

Who's responsible, AI or a human? That misses the point that noone seems to be responsible at all, even in democracies.

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#117

Post by victorbjorklund »

namuol wrote: post #94

> “We just launch it and we know everything will be dead – everything that will be found there in this particular area will be dead,” says Kokhanovskyy. “There is no connection to the drone at all, you cannot see the video, nothing… Everything it sees will be killed.” This is a clear war crime. We don’t need to update any international laws, do we? This is by definition indiscriminate, like landmines or chemical weap…

There is nothing but valid targets in those zones. Not different from sending a cruise missile on a military base killing everything there.

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#118

Post by krapp »

CrzyLngPwd wrote: post #112

I wonder what that means for war crimes responsibility. Let's say a swarm of these things kills every civilian patient in a hospital or every child in a school. Who is responsible? I'm surprised Israel wasn't the first to field such weapons.

It doesn't mean anything new. The country or entity that deployed them is responsible for their behavior.

Whether any particular country or entity can be held responsible is another question.

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#119

Post by victorbjorklund »

sebastiennight wrote: post #28
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #21

A few thoughts. First, I advise a modicum of skepticism to be retained in the face of such news. Ukraine is, after all, in the middle of an existential crisis and must take every advantage it can, even if it's just scaring Russian invaders further (I bet both Russian and Ukrainian soldiers are already pretty scared of drones). Additionally: "“There is no connection to the drone at all, you cannot see the video, nothi…

> They're fighting for their country's existence. I would use every weapon in my disposal; and I'm a pacifist who hates violence. I'm not sure it's accurate to define yourself as a pacifist if you believe safeguarding the concept of a nation-state is more important than human life, ethics, or the downstream effects of using "every weapon at your disposal". I don't think you realize the creativity and variety we human…

I bet you think it was wrong to fight against Hitler.

Re: Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time

#120

Post by victorbjorklund »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #37
doctorpangloss wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If Ukraine could deploy actual Terminator robots to the front line it would do it in a heartbeat. Completely false. They are beholden to their allies. Ukraine could also reach Moscow with missiles, why doesn't it? It could build a nuclear bomb in 6 months, if not 6 weeks, they have the capabilities, why doesn't it? It's not so simple.

I think the reason Ukraine has not attacked Moscow with missiles is that this would force Russia to retaliate with nuclear missiles. There's a long discussion on this in sources I follow (full disclosure, I tend to listen to John Mearsheimer a lot although I don't believe everything he says) and the consensus is that the latest attacks in Russian land will have consequences. So I agree that it's not so simple but I a…

Russia been saying they will nuke everyone since before the war. They never do anything when meet with strength. Russians even didn’t use nukes when Russian land was under occupation for months. They just raised their fist in the air shaking it and said ”we will show you”.
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