
The Second Amendment in Iraq, Combat Robotics, and the Future of Human Liberty - pchristensen
http://vinay.howtolivewiki.com/blog/global/the-second-amendment-in-iraq-combat-robotics-and-the-future-of-human-liberty-820?
======
caffeine
To sum up: "If crushing resistance doesn't require blood, what's to stop an
epidemic of resistance-crushing?"

Nothing.

Already, there's nothing. Resistance _has_ been crushed. On some other thread,
they're about to lock a guy in a cage for an eighth of his natural life span -
for circumventing video game copy protection. All we can do is fucking blog
about it. It's crushed, and there's nothing we can do about it, and robots
will just make it a little more crushed.

~~~
wooby
There have existed, and do exist, cultures which value human lives lost in
combat the same way we will view robots lost in combat. In a sense, our enemy
already thinks this way. Each Jihadist's death, to them, is a victory in
itself, and but one of many to come; a mark of progress in what is certainly
the most glorious and successful guerilla campaign of all time.

I thought the author's arguments were heavily culturally-bound, and I don't
think the use of robots in combat will change anything about the nature of
war. Killing can be automated; war, and winning wars, cannot. There will
always be repercussions the belligerent's society will be able to understand
as "loss." Our current definition is lost troops. Our future enemies will
figure it out if it changes, and make it as clear to us as possible in terms
we can understand why we will not win. Nowadays, their tools are insurgency
and domestic terrorism. Who knows what they will be in the future.

Preventing the start of future wars doesn't have anything, in my view, to do
with stopping the Pentagon from further automating killing. As long as we as a
country feel the need to maintain a military, we must continue innovating with
the tools and techniques of war.

A larger and scarier problem with our country, in my view, is our society's
perspectives - on itself, on the world, on the meaning of life and death in
general. It is this perspective, and collective awareness, that will guide the
way we use both our military and its robots in the future to solve problems
and protect ourselves. The average American has never served in the military,
seen directly or even heard second-hand the nature of war or the military. The
average American hasn't even ever left the country, nor spoken another
language. How can our leaders, products of such a society, be expected to make
decisions about the application of war?

It's a question that saddens me because I don't think there's an answer, and
this post has turned into a rant. Forgive me, back to coding!

------
krschultz
I see his point, but I think we are already powerless against the government
militarily.

What does the average American have that can stop a tank, or an armored
personnel carrier, or a jet, or a helicopter.

Iraq disbanded its military, all those guys went home with AK-47s and knew
where the ammo depots were. The IEDs beating our guys are up often artillery
shells wired to a cell phone. We all have cell phones, who knows how to get
artillery shells in the US? Not nearly enough people to make a decent fight.

The only way it could happen here is if a significant portion of the US
military sided with the revolutionaries - ironically what happened in both the
American Revolution and the Civil War. There is no example of a successful
revolution based solely on civilian soldiers. A lot of the people in the US
army during the revolution were civilians prior to the shooting, but they were
led by men who had fought in the French & Indian war for the British.

So if some of the military is joining the breakaway sect, robots or not will
not change the situation since both sides will have them.

I'm still more worried about chemical, biological, or nuclear attack.

~~~
asciilifeform
> What does the average American have that can stop a tank, or an armored
> personnel carrier, or a jet, or a helicopter

The conscience of the man in the driver's seat.

This is precisely the safeguard that police/military robots (controlled
directly by generals or even politicians) will take out of the loop.

> robots or not will not change the situation since both sides will have them.

The side with control over the nation's industrial capacity will have them.
This is the side that will win. And it will almost certainly be a cause for
regret.

Technologies are not neutral:

 _"It is a commonplace that the history of civilisation is largely the history
of weapons. In particular, the connection between the discovery of gunpowder
and the overthrow of feudalism by the bourgeoisie has been pointed out over
and over again. And though I have no doubt exceptions can be brought forward,
I think the following rule would be found generally true: that ages in which
the dominant weapon is expensive or difficult to make will tend to be ages of
despotism, whereas when the dominant weapon is cheap and simple, the common
people have a chance. Thus, for example, tanks, battleships and bombing planes
are inherently tyrannical weapons, while rifles, muskets, long-bows and hand-
grenades are inherently democratic weapons. A complex weapon makes the strong
stronger, while a simple weapon--so long as there is no answer to it--gives
claws to the weak."_

"You and the Atomic Bomb", by George Orwell.

(<http://tmh.floonet.net/articles/abombs.html>)

~~~
anigbrowl
_The conscience of the man in the driver's seat._ Regrettably, this has turned
out to be a fungible good in many contexts. Although I don't think we're
doomed - the internet's democratization of information after all gives us far
greater access to knowledge than was possible 20 years ago, for example - I am
profoundly depressed by the willingness of many to have their freedoms eroded
( a lot of the more rabid type of 2nd amendment supporters seemed
incongruously comfortable with the patriot act, for example, presumably on the
basis that it was something they only expected to affect Other People).

------
DanielBMarkham
There's a legitmate point in there somewhere, so I think the article deserves
to be voted up.

And before I start my critique: I'm a libertarian. I agree that there is a
real problem that needs attention.

But the delivery was awful! First he picks Iraq as an example to make a point
that people of both political spectrums can understand -- not a good choice
due to all the controversy of what's going on there. Fred the AQ operative
from Libya blowing up a Shi'ite mosque is not really fighting for self-
determination. Some are, no doubt. But picking this example really screws up
the argument. It sounds like "we won in Iraq so something really evil must
come out of it!", kind of reasoning. Ugh.

Then we have the premise that robots can be used for counter-insurgency. While
I agree that there are many pointy-headed folks at DoD who think this, it's
not the way counter-insurgency works. The whole idea is to get real, live
troops out into the field and interacting with the local population,
protecting it. Protect the people first. Killer robots hosing down random
houses with tear gas and tasers really don't meet that criteria.

At some point after the first few paragraphs, I pictured the author as waving
their hands around in the air wildly and screaming "The robots are coming! The
robots are coming!" Probably not fair to the author, but dude, you lost me.
Calm down a bit and make a cogent point with supporting evidence. Tell a
story. Do something except rant on for so long. Towards the end I was just
skimming. You'd made your point and life is short.

"By globally respecting the right to self-defense recognized in America as the
Second Amendment we can avoid an entire set of grossly negative and
destructive futures."

But the Second Amendment is titled "The Second Amendment to the United States
Constitution". It all kind of fits together as one huge compromise (the Bill
of Rights) added on to the Constitution to get ratification. Other countries
have already disarmed their populations and are very good at oppressing them
and preventing change without robots. Even the U.S. took the ability of most
people from owning combat firearms away in the 1930s as a way to prevent
crime. As a world, we've already mostly lost our ability to enact forceful
change. Those days are gone. You're late to the party, and while it's great
this robot thing has woken you up, robots are just another tool in a very
large toolbox that states use to keep the folks in line.

Finally, this is technology. It's not just the U.S., or DoD. This is the
incredible, wonderful, terrible, and awful march of progress. You'd have a
better chance stopping a freight train with rubber bands than to make a dent
in the inexorable advance of new ways to control people.

So less ranting and more analysis and recommendations, please?

~~~
RobGR
I wish to nitpick your discription of the 1930s federal gun law as taking away
the ability of most people to own combat firearms. That law was rather
carefully crafted to try to avoid taking away the right to own "combat"
firearms, because those firearms are exactly the ones to which the 2d
amendment would apply. Rather, it focused on cannons and bombs, which they
could argue were not personal arms, and on what it called "tools of
assassination", silenced weapons and automatic weapons. Automatic weapons were
not common combat firearms at the time, most soldiers would have rifles that
were bolt action, a few semi-automatic.

At the time the law was passed the New Dealers were fighting the Supreme
Court, which was overturning a lot of their grand plans, so the gun law was
crafted with that in mind. It doesn't even technically ban the "class III"
weapons, it just requires an excise tax which is difficult to pay. It is still
probably an unconstitutional law, and it's benefits in fighting crime are
probably not very big -- the old tommy gun gangsters of the 1930s were not
driven out of business by lack of automatic weapons, they were tracked down
and killed and arrested by traditional police work (some of which was
unconstitutional in other ways).

A larger objection I have is to your claim "we've already mostly lost out
ability to enact forceful change. Those days are gone." I think the general
trend from 1776 to now, has been towards a more just, more democratic, more
ideal society. There are major deviations on the way, and we are currently
regressing, but still ahead of where we were in 1960, I think.

I also think robot technology will not always benefit just the rich and
powerful in conflicts. Hobbiests can already build model aircraft which carry
a WRT54G and do auto-pilot; when Palestinians hack a cell phone onto a model
plane and send a few ounces of incendiary or a grenade on a long, slow trip to
be fairly precisely delivered via GPS or cell tower positioning, then you will
know the temporary imbalence is ending.

~~~
shpxnvz
_it just requires an excise tax which is difficult to pay_

For anyone interested, it's not actually very difficult to get the NFA tax
stamp. The cost is a flat $200 per regulated item (each automatic weapon or
sound suppressor counts) but for an individual you do have to get approval in
writing from a local Chief Law Enforcement Officer; a local Chief of Police or
Sheriff will do. A great deal of local agencies are not too keen on having
citizens with NFA weapons, however if the weapon is to be transferred to a
valid trust, there is no requirement for local approval (1). Of course, you
then have to wait for the BATFE to actually get around to processing your
application, which can take months.

The real problem with NFA automatic weapons is scarcity - only automatic
weapons manufactured prior to 1986 are allowed for civilian ownership, so
interested parties are limited to existing stock.

(1) Note that a state or locality may, and often do, have more strict
regulation (or outright bans) than the federal government.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Firearms_Act>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearm_Owners_Protection_Act>

------
jacquesm
earlier today on HN:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=740959>

