Can ethical robots be built?
09:09 GMT, December 11, 2008 At the dawn of the age of autonomous robots, there has been a sudden surge in concern over the ability to intelligent machines to make ethical choices. Ethics can be challenging, in theory and in practice. But from a technical perspective, things might not be so bad. The Pentagon recently hired a British scientist to help build robot soldiers who “won’t commit war crimes.” (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/3536943/Pentagon-hires-British-scientist-to-help-build-robot-soldiers-that-wont-commit-war-crimes.html) “A British robotics expert has been recruited by the US Navy to advise them on building robots that do not violate the Geneva Conventions.” Excellent. My hope is that he is an engineer. What is needed is a coding of the Geneva Convention that engineers can easily use as design requirements. Better still if there’s a version that computer programs can understand. If the product of the work is not specifically geared toward techn
