Saturday, January 22, 2011

The Drone

The flying weapon with Artificial intelligence woke up. "I am awake. What is my assignment?", thought the drone in typical unquestioning thought. The thought wasn't "I'm awake. What is it that is asked of me and is it something I can live with?" No. This wasn't asked because there was no conscience or real ethics contemplated at all. Not only that no thought was given to mortality of the vehicle that the artificial intelligence resided in. Part of the reason for this was that there were thousands of other hunter-killers at various other locations in the world. Though they were all expensive, theoretically they were also all expendable. Also, one could theoretically erase any memories that humans found distasteful, either on board the drone or the videos and telemetry and other computer data on the ground somewhere in the U.S. or at other points throughout the world or in GPS satellites used for guidance reference points by either a human (on the ground pilot) or directly by the artificial intelligence within the drone when human contact is lost (more frequently than you might imagine). Imagine you are talking on your cell phone and the call drops for whatever reason for human contact with a flying drone is about as good, more or less as any cell phone call being made on earth. The drone flying robot is programmed to go on without human contact and to execute its orders or people alone without any human help just fine , including launching it's missiles and killing almost anyone on earth in an instant from above completely unexpected by the now dying person.

note: The reason this is being written is not to say that these drones are not defending our country (the U.S.) from those who would kill us and destroy our civilization. The reason this is being written is to remind the world that these hunter-killer drones whether they be in the air, or space, or on the ground and   in or below the water  have no conscience at all the way they are presently programmed. Now, that may not be a problem for most people on earth who likely don't understand how programming within any computer or robot actually works. However, for those of us who do, many of us can see the seeds of a real life "Terminator" movie in the making and the drones are early "hunter-killers" of the future that might hunt down not just terrorists, But ANYONE in the future. There is no conscience or right or wrong or ethics or even of self preservation within any drone at present beyond a certain point. Though this all might have seemed theoretical when we all saw the first "Terminator" movies. However, it is no longer theoretical, it is actual. And the number of aerial hunter-killer drones and land and sea and likely space drones are growing by the thousands. And any one of them could theoretically end your life or mine. So, as these drones proliferate throughout all nations who will be in charge of them? And who will erase any records of embarrassing deaths that they don't want the rest of the world to know about? With no witnesses, how can any case be brought against anyone for murder by stealth by air, water or land by these vehicles in the future? This is a potential legal and civilization nightmare in the making worldwide right now.

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