Bring on the Killer Robots?

So an Artificial Intelligence Expert I saw on Colbert’s Late Night program, says that AI will never become the ‘Singularity’ of The Terminator Movie series because it does not have a physical mind, and therefore can never attain self-consciousness. 

AI is only ‘software,’ a physical mind is required for awareness.  In short, a pigeon is more intelligent that an AI computer – the pigeon can also play table tennis – as demonstrated by B.F. Skinner.  However, I would never trust AI or a pigeon to make moral or ethical choices.

Yet autotomized weaponry progresses day to day and week to week.  Self-defense seems to the mother of invention. 

More than a few of my Cambridge International Exams Global Perspectives students chose robotic military weapons as their 5,000 word essay in order to fulfill one of several course requirements for credit.

The ethical considerations, the practical considerations, and the moral considerations.   Three categories not easily fulfilled. 

Rescue robots can assist rescue dogs and humans searching for casualties following natural disasters.  Saving and assisting and or recovering human remains is inherently moral.  Taking human life, not so much.

So the Russian war against Ukrainian has become even more robotic.  Attack drones seem to be the flavor of this month both in Iran and Ukraine.  While more Western allies are joining one or both of the current wars to help defend against Iranian and Russian counter-attacks. 

Regime change in Iran will not happen without “Boots on the Ground,” or perhaps serious gun smuggling into the hands of Iranian dissidents.  Where is Humphrey Bogart when you need him?  His character ‘Richard Blaine’ is said to have “Run guns to Ethiopia,” then under Italian rule. Captain Renault quips “The winning side would have paid you better.”

Of course the undeclared and illegal US war against Iran is ultimately the fault of the United States’ CIA coup of a democratically elected Socialist government during the height of The Cold War. Believing its own BS, multiple sections of tax supported agencies, intervened secretly, and sometimes overtly, to protect the financial interests of multinational Western corporations.  In Iran’s case, it was the Nationalization of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company during a time when the best minds in US leadership and governance essentially equated Socialism with actual Communism. I would have chastised former students for such an ignorant analysis.

These same destructive interventions caused suffering in multiple nations from Asia, to South America, to Central America to Africa and the Asian subcontinent.  But the movie Argo, The Year of Living Dangerously and all the Bond movies do not compensate for the level of suffering and injustice.

President Trump continues to get away with murder because of the cowardice of Republican politicians elected to Congress.

Speaking of Bond and United Kingdom hegemony, France is equality responsible for the constant conflict erupting in the Middle East.  Following the fall of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War One, these two imperialist powers divided up the various peoples of that Biblical territory for their own financial advantage in the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916. Russia also collected some of the spoils, taking over the rule of Armenia.

Britain controlled Iraq and Kuwait as a ‘protectorate.’  France collected Lebanon and Syria as its ‘protectorate.’  Palestine was jointly controlled by all three nations.  The online Encyclopedia Britannica has a fine article and colored map of the conquered territories.

On the positive side, following a late entry into World War One, US Democratic President Woodrow Wilson lobbied for his Fourteen Points to guide all future international relations, which declared “Freedom of the Seas” and creation of a League of Nations where international disputes might be negotiated without resulting to war.  Prime Minister Clemenceau quipped “The Good Lord only had ten!”

This mutual attitude to maintain imperialistic practices, and both countries insistence on extracting impossible reparations and limits on future German military, essentially guaranteed the rise of Nazism and World War Two.

Followed almost immediately by a Cold War lasting until 1989.  And the development by several countries – including Israel – of nuclear weapons and Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. 

And people wonder why Iran wants both.

Brother James, safely ensconced in Obidos, Portugal.  My bomb shelter is in the indoor heated pool of the nearby Marriot Hotel.