“We fear that rapid developments in technology are racing ahead of diplomacy, and call on all nations to step-up their response to the concerns raised over autonomous weapons,” says Campaign to Stop Killer Robots coordinator Mary Wareham of Human Rights Watch. “Governments need to take concrete steps aimed at beginning negotiations to preemptively ban weapons systems that operate without meaningful human control.”
Ms. Wareham will be in Ottawa on Nov. 5 to discuss the campaign and its call for a ban on autonomous weapons just days before an important UN decision regarding the ongoing debate over autonomous weapons. Joining her on the panel will be Paul Hannon, Executive Director of Mines Action Canada, as well as Prof. Kerr, the event’s organizer and holder of the Canada Research Chair in Ethics, Law and Technology.
The 90-minute panel will provide an overview of the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots, its principle concerns, and recent developments at the UN, including Canada’s role and possible implications of the recent federal election in Canada.
“Canada ought to take a firm position against autonomous weapons because allowing life-or-death decisions to be delegated to machines with artificial intelligence crosses afundamental moral line,” says Prof. Kerr. “Permitting weapons to operate without meaningful human control would represent a stark shift in international humanitarian norms and a willful, intentional, and unprecedented removal of humans from the kill decision loop.”
Thursday’s discussion comes on the heels of outreach by Ms. Wareham and Prof. Kerr at the UN General Assembly First Committee on Disarmament and International Security in New York on October 20, 2015, where more than 30 nations and five groups of states raised autonomous weapons concerns and indicated support for more international talks on the matter in 2016. Canada did not address autonomous weapons in its statements to the meeting. On November 13, Canada and other states will decide whether to continue and deepen deliberations at the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) ahead of the CCW’s Fifth Review Conference in December 2016.
“A positive decision at the UN to continue the work addressing autonomous weapons concerns is crucial not only to the future of warfare but also the future of humanity,” says Prof. Kerr. “Autonomous weapons currently under research and development are ‘unpredictable by design.’ Like Google’s driverless cars and IBM’s “Watson,” the decision-making processes of these killing machines will contain so many inputs and such complex algorithms that no human being might ever be able to fully understand the underlying ‘rationale’ of their particular operations, let alone predict, foresee, or justify them. In a war context, this starts to look like playing a strange game of Russian roulette with other people’s lives.”
Many of the topics addressed in these discussions are analyzed in a recent academic paper by Prof. Kerr and Common Law graduate Katie Szilagyi, entitled “Evitable Conflicts, Inevitable Technologies? The Science and Fiction of Robotic Warfare and IHL.” Click here to view the paper online.
Prof. Kerr also has a forthcoming book, entitled Robot Law, which addresses many of the key issues in the autonomous weapons discussion. Click here for more information on Robot Law.
Event Details:
Canada and the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots
Thursday, November 5, 2015
11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.
University of Ottawa, Fauteaux Hall, room 302.
The event is free of charge, and media and the public are invited to attend.
Q&A will follow the panel discussion.
About the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots:
The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots is an international coalition dedicated to preemptively banning fully autonomous weapons. The alliance calls on nations to establish and articulate policy on autonomous weapons and start working to preemptively ban them through an international treaty and national laws. The Campaign aims to provide a coordinated civil society response to the ethical, legal and technical challenges raised by autonomous weapons. It is composed of more than 55 international NGOs, including Human Rights Watch, International Committee for Robot Arms Control, Nobel Women’s Initiative, Pugwash Conferences on Science & World Affairs, and Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. stopkillerrobots.org
About Mary Wareham:
Mary Wareham is advocacy director of the Arms Division, where she leads Human Rights Watch’s advocacy against particularly problematic weapons that pose a significant threat to civilians. She is also serving as the global coordinator of the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots. (more) (twitter)
About Ian Kerr:
Dr. Ian Kerr holds the Canada Research Chair in Ethics, Law & Technology at the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law. He also holds cross-appointments to the Faculty of Medicine, the Department of Philosophy and the School of Information Studies. His research focuses on the ethical and legal implications of artificial intelligence, robotics and implantable devices.
Media Contact:
Ian Kerr, University of Ottawa, iankerr@uottawa.ca
The University of Ottawa can provide broadcast quality audio and video of this event.