Expert: Automated Killer Robots Are "Threat To Humanity"

Can't slip a thing past this guy, huh?

Yes, Poindexter, that's rather the fucking whole point of a killer robot. Just like prom night is a a "threat to virginity."

At least I hope it is. I missed mine and I'm hoping to finally get an invitation this year. Call me, Tiffany. I may be old and broken down but I can legally purchase Zima. And nunchucks, if that gets you hot.

I'm not sure why AFP had to specify the robots in question are "automated," as opposed, I guess, to all those non-automated robots out there, which we typically just call "refrigerators" or "Schick Mach III razors" or "mechanical pencils," but I guess the MSM knows best.

Increasingly autonomous, gun-totting robots developed for warfare could easily fall into the hands of terrorists and may one day unleash a robot arms race, a top expert on artificial intelligence told AFP.

"They pose a threat to humanity," said University of Sheffield professor Noel Sharkey ahead of a keynote address Wednesday before Britain's Royal United Services Institute.

Intelligent machines deployed on battlefields around the world -- from mobile grenade launchers to rocket-firing drones -- can already identify and lock onto targets without human help.

There are more than 4,000 US military robots on the ground in Iraq, as well as unmanned aircraft that have clocked hundreds of thousands of flight hours.

The first three armed combat robots fitted with large-caliber machine guns deployed to Iraq last summer, manufactured by US arms maker Foster-Miller, proved so successful that 80 more are on order, said Sharkey.

But up to now, a human hand has always been required to push the button or pull the trigger.

It we are not careful, he said, that could change.

Military leaders "are quite clear that they want autonomous robots as soon as possible, because they are more cost-effective and give a risk-free war," he said.

Yeah, a war in which our boys don't get killed or maimed. Who'd want that. Why, it might give us some sort unfair advantage fighting vicious terrorist monsters or something.

Thanks to BumperStickerist.

posted by Ace at 11:41 AM

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