Lethal Autonomous Weapons

Re-Examining the Law and Ethics of Robotic Warfare

Edited by Jai Galliott, Duncan MacIntosh, and Jens David Ohlin

Ethics, National Security, and the Rule of Law

Features some of the most prominent academics and academic-practitioners in the lethal autonomous weapons space
Focuses on exploring the moral and legal issues associated with the design, development, and deployment of lethal autonomous weapons
Looks for new and innovative approaches to understanding the law and ethics of autonomous weapons systems

Lethal Autonomous Weapons

Re-Examining the Law and Ethics of Robotic Warfare

Edited by Jai Galliott, Duncan MacIntosh, and Jens David Ohlin

Ethics, National Security, and the Rule of Law

Description

The question of whether new rules or regulations are required to govern, restrict, or even prohibit the use of autonomous weapon systems has been the subject of debate for the better part of a decade. Despite the claims of advocacy groups, the way ahead remains unclear since the international community has yet to agree on a specific definition of Lethal Autonomous Weapon Systems and the great powers have largely refused to support an effective ban. In this vacuum, the public has been presented with a heavily one-sided view of Killer Robots.

This volume presents a more nuanced approach to autonomous weapon systems that recognizes the need to progress beyond a discourse framed by the Terminator and HAL 9000. Re-shaping the discussion around this emerging military innovation requires a new line of thought and a willingness to challenge the orthodoxy.

Lethal Autonomous Weapons focuses on exploring the moral and legal issues associated with the design, development and deployment of lethal autonomous weapons. In this volume, we bring together some of the most prominent academics and academic-practitioners in the lethal autonomous weapons space and seek to return some balance to the debate. As part of this effort, we recognize that society needs to invest in hard conversations that tackle the ethics, morality, and law of these new digital technologies and understand the human role in their creation and operation.

Lethal Autonomous Weapons

Re-Examining the Law and Ethics of Robotic Warfare

Edited by Jai Galliott, Duncan MacIntosh, and Jens David Ohlin

Ethics, National Security, and the Rule of Law

Introduction
List of Contributors

The Case for Lethal Autonomous Weapons

Chapter One: Fire and Forget: A Moral Defense of the Use of Autonomous Weapons Systems in War and Peace
Duncan MacIntosh
Chapter Two: The Robot Dogs of War
Deane-Peter Baker
Chapter Three: Understanding AI & Autonomy: Problematizing the Meaningful Human Control Argument Against Killer Robots
Tim McFarland & Jai Galliott
Chapter Four: The Humanitarian Imperative For Minimally-Just AI In Weapons
Jason Scholz and Jai Galliott

Humans, Robots & Values

Chapter Five: Programming Precision? Requiring Robust Transparency for AWS
Steven J. Barela & Avery Plaw
Chapter Six: May Machines Take Lives to Save Lives? Human Perceptions of Autonomous Robots (with the Capacity to Kill)
Matthias Scheutz and Bertram F. Malle
Chapter Seven: The Better Instincts of Humanity: Humanitarian Arguments in Defense of International Arms Control
Natalia Jevglevskaja and Rain Liivoja
Chapter Eight: Toward a Positive Statement of Ethical Principles for Military AI
Jai Galliott
Chapter Nine: Empirical Data on Attitudes Towards Autonomous Systems
Jai Galliott, Bianca Baggiarini, Sean Rupka

The Rationality of Automaticity

Chapter Ten: The Automation of Authority: Discrepancies with Jus Ad Bellum Principles
Donovan Phillips
Chapter Eleven: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of Armed Conflict
Alex Leveringhaus
Chapter Twelve: Autonomous Weapons and Reactive Attitudes
Jens David Ohlin
Chapter Thirteen: Blind brains and moral machines: neuroscience and autonomous weapon systems
Nicholas G. Evans

Developing Meaningful Human Control

Chapter Fourteen: Enforced Transparency: A Solution to Autonomous Weapons as Potentially Uncontrollable Weapons Similar to Bioweapons
Armin Krishnan
Chapter 15: Normative Epistemology for Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems
Kate Devitt
Chapter Sixteen: Proposing a regional normative framework for limiting the potential for unintentional or escalatory engagements with increasingly autonomous weapon systems.
Austin Wyatt and Jai Galliott
Chapter Seventeen: The Human Role in Autonomous Weapon Design and Deployment
M.L. Cummings

Lethal Autonomous Weapons

Re-Examining the Law and Ethics of Robotic Warfare

Edited by Jai Galliott, Duncan MacIntosh, and Jens David Ohlin

Ethics, National Security, and the Rule of Law

Author Information

Jai Galliott is Director of the Values in Defence & Security Technology Group at the Australian Defence Force Academy, Non-Residential Fellow at the Modern War Institute at the United States Military Academy, West Point and Visiting Fellow in The Centre for Technology and Global Affairs at the University of Oxford. Dr Galliott has developed a reputation as one of the foremost experts on the socio-ethical implications of artificial intelligence (AI) and is regarded as an internationally respected scholar on the ethical, legal and strategic issues associated with the employment of emerging technologies, including cyber systems, autonomous vehicles and soldier augmentation

Duncan MacIntosh is a Professor of Philosophy and Department Chair at Dalhousie University. Professor MacIntosh works in metaethics, decision and action theory, metaphysics, philosophy of language, epistemology, and philosophy of science. He has written on desire-based theories of rationality, the relationship between rationality and time, the reducibility of morality to rationality, modeling morality and rationality with the tools of action and game theory, scientific realism, and a number of other topics.

Jens David Ohlin is Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at Cornell Law School. He specializes in international law and criminal law. He specifically focuses on the laws of war with special emphasis on the effects of new technology on the waging of warfare, including unmanned drones in the strategy of targeted killings, cyber-warfare, and the role of non-state actors in armed conflicts. He authored The Assault on International Law (2015).

Contributors:

Matthias Scheutz is Professor of Computer and Cognitive Science in the Department of Computer Science at Tufts University and Senior Gordon Faculty Fellow in Tuft's School of Engineering.

Bertram F. Malle is Professor of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences and Co-Director of the Humanity-Centered Robotics Initiative at Brown University.

Jason Scholz is the Chief Executive for the Trusted Autonomous Systems Defence Cooperative Research Centre.

Nicholas G. Evans is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, where he conducts research on national security and emerging technologies.

Donovan Phillips is a first-year PhD. Candidate at The University of Western Ontario, by way of Dalhousie University, M.A. (2019) and Kwantlen Polytechnic University, B.A. (2017).

Natalia Jevglevskaja is a Research Fellow at the University of New South Wales at the Australian Defence Force Academy in Canberra.

Rain Liivoja is an Associate Professor at the University of Queensland, where he leads the Law and the Future of War Research Group.

Alex Leveringhaus is a Lecturer in Political Theory in the Politics Department at the University of Surrey, United Kingdom, where he co-directs the Centre for International Intervention (cii).

Armin Krishnan is an Associate Professor and Director of Security Studies at East Carolina University.

Tim McFarland is a Research Fellow in the Values in Defence & Security Technology group within the School of Engineering and Information Technology of the University of New South Wales at the Australian Defence Force Academy.

Deane-Peter Baker is an Associate Professor of International and Political Studies and Co-Convener (with Prof David Kilcullen) of the Future Operations Research Group in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the UNSW Canberra.

Duncan MacIntosh is a Professor of Philosophy and Department Chair at Dalhousie University.

Steven Barela is an Assistant Professor at the Global Studies Institute and a member of the law faculty at the University of Geneva.

Avery Plaw is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth.

Kate Devitt is the Deputy Chief Scientist of the Trusted Autonomous Systems Defence Cooperative Research Centre and a Social & Ethical Robotics Researcher at the Defence Science and technology group (the primary research organization for the Australia Department of Defence).

Jai Galliott is Director of the Values in Defence & Security Technology Group at the Australian Defence Force Academy, Non-Residential Fellow at the Modern War Institute at the United States Military Academy, West Point and Visiting Fellow in The Centre for Technology and Global Affairs at the University of Oxford.

Jens David Ohlin is Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at Cornell Law School.

Bianca Baggiarini is a political sociologist and Senior Lecturer at UNSW, Canberra.

Sean Rupka is a political theorist and PhD student at UNSW Canberra working on the impact of autonomous systems on contemporary warfare.

Austin Wyatt is a political scientist and Research Associate at UNSW, Canberra.

Mary (Missy) Cummings is currently a Professor in the Duke University Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, and the Director of the Humans and Autonomy Laboratory. She is an AIAA Fellow, and a member of the Defense Innovation Board and Veoneer, Inc. Board of Directors.