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The Humanization of Robots and the Robotization of the Human Person
This paper opens with an introduction by the Caritas in Veritate Foundation and contains all of the Holy See’s UN statements on killer robots.
A stark reality of history, and of weapons in particular, is that the fascination for rapid developments in science and technology has often outpaced thoughtful developments in human responsibility, values, conscience and international humanitarian law that such progresses ought to consider. The case of Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (LAWS) is no exception. It has been argued that this could very well be a “Revolution in Military Affairs” (RMA), with respective risks to fundamentally change the nature of conflicts. For these reasons and in order to understand the range and gravity of fundamental ethical issues and implications involved, it is of the utmost importance to enhance the discussion on autonomy in its various applications and in all segments of our society. One of the objectives of this publication is to provoke a debate to develop an informed position to establish a common understanding of the subject matter.
The original publication can be found here.
...for a machine, a human person, just like everything else, is only a set of numbers, is only one being among others, interchangeable, and an object of application of certain rules or protocols. Now this is precisely the “inhuman”: the delegation of powers to autonomous machines puts us on the path of negation, oblivion or contempt for the essential characteristics unique to the human persons.
