Amnesty International is already pushing to ban killer robots

Killer robots may sound like the stuff of science fiction, but the prospect is much closer than many suspect. "[Lethal robots] aren't outside the realm of possibility," explains Rasha Abdul Rahim of Amnesty International, a humanitarian advocacy nonprofit. "They are only one step away from being autonomous and this is why people, and more importantly governments, need to start taking this issue seriously."

That's why Amnesty is pushing the United Nations to enact a preemptive ban on autonomous weapons, requiring the decision to kill to remain a human calculus. The U.N. has three weapons conventions scheduled for November.

Amnesty is not the first to warn against the dangers of lethal robots. Last year, scientist Stephen Hawking warned that artificial intelligence "could spell the end of the human race," and tech entrepreneur Elon Musk has said that it is "potentially more dangerous than nukes."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up