Musk, Hawking, Wozniak, 1000 Scientists: Ban ‘Terminators’

Two entrepreneurs and the world’s most acclaimed quantum physicist say the threat of autonomus weapons in on the horizon and very real – and have signed onto a letter calling for a ban on “AI” warfare R&D as military officials, eager for the most advanced weapons possible, say “Talk to the hand!”

More than a thousand researchers, AI experts, and high-profile business leaders say war is getting out of hand and we should ban “offensive autonomous weapons,” lest the world powers wind up in a “military artificial intelligence arms race.” They would ban AI development for warfare and autonomous weapons that decide who, what, where, and when to fire. They’d draw the line so as to allow remotely operated devices under human control, however, such as drones are now.

The signatories include Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, professor Stephen Hawking, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis, and about 1,000 others. The letter will be presented at the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence Wednesday in Buenos Aires, according to the Guardian, which first reported the story.

According to the letter, “AI technology has reached a point where the deployment of [autonomous weapons] is – practically if not legally – feasible within years, not decades, and the stakes are high: autonomous weapons have been described as the third revolution in warfare, after gunpowder and nuclear arms.”

On the one hand, they say, artificial intelligence makes the battlefield safer. On the other, it lowers the risk of going to war, especially for the side that strikes first or has more and better AI weaponry.

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