Da Capo, Dr. Strangelove! This Time With Artificial "Intelligence"

Just around the corner, it seems, are autonomous killer drones, killer robots and killer whatever. And of course we have to have them to make sure that the other side doesn't get them first. Not to mention the fact that miscellaneous terrorists near and far will one day get their hands on them too.

"Almost unnoticed outside defense circles, the Pentagon has put artificial intelligence at the center of its strategy to maintain the United States’ position as the world’s dominant military power. It is spending billions of dollars to develop what it calls autonomous and semiautonomous weapons and to build an arsenal stocked with the kind of weaponry that until now has existed only in Hollywood movies and science fiction, raising alarm among scientists and activists concerned by the implications of a robot arms race.
The Defense Department is designing robotic fighter jets that would fly into combat alongside manned aircraft. It has tested missiles that can decide what to attack, and it has built ships that can hunt for enemy submarines, stalking those it finds over thousands of miles, without any help from humans. 

'If Stanley Kubrick directed ‘Dr. Strangelove’ again, it would be about the issue of autonomous weapons,' said Michael Schrage, a research fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Sloan School of Management."

Matthew Rosenberg and John Markoff: The Pentagon's 'Terminator Conundrum': Robots That Could Kill on their Own. (New York Times, October 25, 2016)

Hoping for a Hollywood ending?

Dream on!

P.S. I noted the coming of autonomous killer robots in a blog post from 2013.

McCain Pops-Up and and Asks Obama to Show Putin All his Cards

Senator John McCain -- a Republican senator from Arizona, and predictable political pop-up doll that seldom misses a chance to call for our attention -- is "deeply concerned" that Putin's expansion could continue.

"President Obama said that Russia would face 'costs' if it intervened militarily in Ukraine," McCain said. "It is now essential for the President to articulate exactly what those costs will be and to take steps urgently to impose them." (CNN)

Yes, Mr. President, why didn't you put all your cards on the table immediately, and why haven't you evicted the Russian troops already?

Seriously, if Putin's aggression wasn't bad enough, now we will have to endure the Republican choir mocking the president, and we will hear calls for military mobilization and preparations for war from the neocons, who have felt rather lonely since W deflated. Not so sure though about the Tea Party. Will they embrace a new war even if it means more deficit spending (or more taxes)?

What Do We Do Once the Autonomous Lethal Robots Have Arrived?

A brilliant speech about horrible prospects right around the corner. It's so scary, but fortunately, there might be a solution if we chose to use it.