Three Laws Blog: Law and Artificial Intelligence

Anderson and Waxman on Debating Autonomous Weapon Systems, Their Ethics, and Their Regulation Under International Law @kennethanderson @mattwaxman1 @OUPAcademic

Kenneth Anderson, American University College of Law, and Matthew C. Waxman, Columbia Law School, are publishing Debating Autonomous Weapon Systems, Their Ethics, and Their Regulation Under International Law in The Oxford Handbook of Law, Regulation, and Technology (Roger Brownsword, Eloise Scotford, and Karen Yeung, eds., OUP, 2017). Here is the abstract.

An international public debate over the law and ethics of autonomous weapon systems (AWS) has been underway since 2012, with those urging legal regulation of AWS under existing principles and requirements of the international law of armed conflict, on the one side, in argument with opponents who favor, instead, a preemptive international treaty ban on all such weapons, on the other. This Chapter provides an introduction to this international debate, offering the main arguments on each side. These include disputes over defining an AWS, the morality and law of automated targeting and target selection by machine, and the interaction of humans and machines in the context of lethal weapons of war. Although the Chapter concludes that a categorical ban on AWS is unjustified morally and legally — favoring the law of armed conflict’s existing case-by-case legal evaluation — it offers an exposition of arguments on each side of the AWS issue. Notes: This Chapter was principally drafted in 2015 and reflects developments only up to that point. The Chapter appears in final form in the Oxford Handbook of Law, Regulation, and Technology (July 2017). This final galley pdf appears by permission of OUP.

Download the chapter from SSRN at the link.

Burri on The Politics of Robot Autonomy @HSGStGallen

Thomas Burri, University of St. Gallen, has published The Politics of Robot Autonomy at 7 European Journal of Risk Regulation 341 (2016). Here is the abstract.

The autonomy robots enjoy is understood in different ways. On the one hand, a technical understanding of autonomy is firmly anchored in the present and concerned with what can be achieved now by means of code and programming; on the other hand, a philosophical understanding of robot autonomy looks into the future and tries to anticipate how robots will evolve in the years to come. The two understandings are at odds at times, occasionally they even clash. However, not one of them is necessarily truer than the other. Each is driven by certain real-life factors; each rests on its own justification. This article discusses these two “views of robot autonomy” in depth and witnesses them at work at two of the most relevant events of robotics in recent times, namely the Darpa Robotics Challenge, which took place in California in June 2015, and the ongoing process to address lethal autonomous weapons in humanitarian Geneva, which is spurred on by a “Campaign to Stop Killer Robots”. Notes: This article was published in June 2016 in (7) European Journal of Risk Regulation (2) pp. 341-360 as part of a special issue including five articles on "The Man and the Machine: When Systems Take Decisions Autonomously", edited by Thomas Burri and Isabelle Wildhaber; the authors of the other articles are Shawn Bayern, Madeleine de Cock Buning, Ugo Pagallo/Massimo Durante, and Melinda Florina Lohmann.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Dunlap on Accountability and Autonomous Weapons

Charles James Dunlap Jr. Duke University School of Law, is publishing Accountability and Autonomous Weapons: Much Ado About Nothing? in the Temple International & Comparative Law Journal. Here is the abstract.

This purpose of this essay is to critique a 2015 report entitled Mind the Gap: The Lack of Accountability for Killer Robots by Human Rights Watch (HRW) produced with the assistance of the Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic (IHRC). The HRW/IHRC paper attempted to establish that autonomous weapons should be banned because, they claim, “neither criminal law nor civil law guarantees adequate accountability for individuals directly or indirectly involved in the use of fully autonomous systems.” Contrary to HRW/IHRC assertions, this article maintains that although no one can “guarantee” accountability, there are sufficient legal tools to do so when appropriate; autonomous weapons are not somehow exempted from legal regimes applicable to other weapons or the law of war more generally. This essay will conclude that the weapons are not unlawful, and further argue – as other have – that it is better to develop norms to control these systems than to attempt to ban them outright.

Download the essay from SSRN at the link.

Terzian on Armed Drones and the Second Amendment

Dan Terzian, Duane Morris LLP, has published The Right to Bear (Robotic) Arms at 117 Penn State Law Review 755 (2013). Here is the abstract.

Can robotic weapons be “Arms” under the Second Amendment? This Article argues that they can. In particular, it challenges the claim that the Second Amendment protects only weapons that can be carried in one’s hands, which has roots in both Supreme Court Second Amendment doctrine (District of Columbia v. Heller) and scholarship. Scrutinizing these roots shows that Heller did not intend to create such a requirement and that little, if any, constitutional basis for it exists. This Article also contextualizes robotic weapons within the established Second Amendment framework for arms. Robotic weapons are not yet arms, but there is no legal impediment — nor should there be — to them becoming arms. Finally this Article presents an alternative theory of Second Amendment protection for robotic weapons based on auxiliary rights, in light of the Seventh Circuit case United States v. Ezell. It posits that Second Amendment auxiliary rights include the right to employ a bodyguard, whether human or robot.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.

Robots and War

"Killer robots" aren't just an idea to build a "Big Bang Theory" episode around. Individuals and groups are already thinking about the law and ethics of using robots in war. Here, some discussion by Kenneth Anderson and Matthew Waxman, of the existing law of war and the current state of the use of robots and drones in war, at the Hoover Institution's Daily Report.