teraflop1

Fascinating report, but I would point out there is a contradiction in terms of the complexity of AI code. The authors (Lin, Abney, and Bekey) state that, "Not only would robots expand the battlespace over difficult, larger areas of terrain, but they also represent a significant force‐multiplier—each effectively doing the work of many human soldiers, while immune to sleep deprivation, fatigue, low morale, perceptual and communication challenges in the ‘fog of war’, and other performance‐hindering conditions." Please do not misunderstand me. I think the report is excellent in its approach and sorely needed, but I do question that last line. How can the authors make the case that the AI code would be too complex to fully analyze for undesirable operation and still claim that robots would be 'immune' to perceptual and communication challenges in the fog of war? A fast AI could just make mistakes faster. An AI's ability to see can still be compromised by clever camouflage both now and in the future. What's more, there is no reason to believe that an advanced robot would not sense its operators displeasure an result in low morale. After all, a good AI will need some facility to interpret emotions. We really are entering an unknown here.