Elon Musk, AI Leaders Call For Ban On Killer Robots Fearing “Third Revolution In Warfare”

Elon Musk is among 116 experts in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics who have called for a ban on lethal autonomous weapons, or “killer robots”.

In their petition to the United Nations, the AI leaders have expressed their fear that development of such technology could lead to the third phase in warfare, after gunpowder and nuclear weapons, and would “permit armed conflict to be fought at a scale greater than ever, and at timescales faster than humans can comprehend”.

Fears of killer robots abound. Questions of morality arise when autonomous weapons are directed to carry out killings without human intervention. There is also the very serious concern that despots and terrorists could use the technology to unleash harm upon innocent people across the globe.

Those in favour of autonomous weapons say the use of killer robots could reduce the number of casualties as they would be superior to humans in discriminating between civilians and combatants.

Others argue that attempts at restricting the development and use of this technology are impractical and already too late.

The United States, China, Russia and Israel are among the countries which are currently deploying lethal autonomous weapons.