This article demonstrates a problem in how information gets communicated. 1. Something happens, technology development, a disaster, a crisis. 2. Millions of people react. 3. News media writes about a slice of this. 4. Thousands of people react to the news media, with parallel thoughts 5. Hundreds of people may decide to try to DO something constructive 6. They are operating in isolation from each other, the overhead of having an organization, figuring out how to manage it, draining a lot of resources. IRAC = International Committee for Robot Arms Control http://icrac.net/2012/11/dod-directive-on-autonomy-in-weapon-systems/ http://icrac.net/2011/12/new-scientist-campaign-asks-for-international-treat y-to-limit-war-robots/ http://www.popsci.com/military-aviation-amp-space/article/2009-09/no-nuke-or -space-military-bots-pleads-arms-control-committee http://blog.tmcnet.com/robotics/2009/09/new-group-aims-to-curb-military-use- of-robots.html They have had international conferences in different nations, proposed conventions, worked on them, promoted them. Yet, years after they started to make progress, someone who works in the same area of expertise (international arms control) is proposing we do, what they have been trying for years. She is not alone. There is also: HRW = Human Rights Watch, an NGO They have an effort to have autonomous weapons, without a human in the loop, banned. They have published a lot about this, and got a lot of reaction: (a) There are people in denial this is a problem. (b) There's a lot of debate in some academic and legal circles, regarding their premises, approaches, practicality. (c) I don't like some things which are being said about humans-in-the-loop. (d) Laws, and treaties, against things don't stop the things. There has to be competent regulation enforcement with all relevant leaders on board. American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Robots http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/smartnews/2013/02/mistreated-robot-now-have- a-advocacy-group/ I found out about it thanks to drone-list. I have memory of other groups, but can't find the citations in the rapid search I checked this morning. The current UN investigation, into war crimes by drones with humans-in-the-loop, may have some results which are relevant. In addition to the Patriot anti-missile system mentioned in the article, there are variants such as the Israeli Iron Dome, and the US Navy AEGIS system, which connects various types of ship weapons to radar, other detection systems, evaluates threats, shoots them down, without a human in the loop. I believe the Vincennes shot down an Iranian airliner, using the AEGIS system. I have much more in my DRONE ROBOT notes. Al Mac (WOW) = Alister William Macintyre _____ -- Too many emails? Unsubscribe, change to digest, or change password by emailing moderator at companys@stanford.edu or changing your settings at https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/drone-list ----- End forwarded message ----- -- Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com http://postbiota.org 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE