WingedViper comments on Near-Term Risk: Killer Robots a Threat to Freedom and Democracy - Less Wrong

10 Post author: Epiphany 14 June 2013 06:28AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (105)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: WingedViper 18 June 2013 10:01:50AM *  0 points [-]

What do you disagree strongly with? My speculation that you would need fewer people to control them? I'm not sure about that so if you can bring in a good argument you can change my view on that.

Terrorists are not our problem (in general and in this specific state). Terrorists with nukes cannot feasably control a country with them.

I am talking about people that have easy access to drones and want to control a country with them. Traditional totalitarian techniques plus drones is what I am really worried about, not terrorists.

So I admit that with "a few people with drones vs. nukes" I thought about a (close to) worst case. Obviously some low tech terrorists in Afghanistan are not a real substantial problem when they control drones, but high military officials with power fantasies are. Of course rouge states with drones are even more dangerous...

Comment author: ikrase 18 June 2013 07:14:01PM 1 point [-]

I think a rogue state with drones is about as dangerous as a rogue state with a well-equipped army. (note: all of this pretty much assumes something like the next ten to fifty years of physical tech, and that drone AIs are very focused. If AI supertech or extremely tiny deadly drones come into it, it gets much worse.)

I think that drone armies compared to human armies are better for short-term slavish loyalty (including cases where the chain of command is broken). However, unless they are controlled by a stable, central entity (such as the case where a tyrant uses a drone army to suppress rebellion) with all the infrastructure then maintenance and a wide variety of other issues start to become a big problem.

You might get some Napoleons.

I also think that drones are likely to be poor substitutes for infantry out of actual combat.