Depersonalisation of killing: Towards a 21st century use of force “Beyond Good and Evil?”
The article analyses how robotisation as the latest advance in military technology can depersonalise the methods of killing in the 21st century by turning enemy soldiers and civilians into mere objects devoid of moral value. The departing assumption is that robotisation of warfare transform...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | deu |
| Published: |
Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, Belgrade
2018-01-01
|
| Series: | Filozofija i Društvo |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/img/doi/0353-5738/2018/0353-57381801049K.pdf |
| Summary: | The article analyses how robotisation as the latest advance in military
technology can depersonalise the methods of killing in the 21st century by
turning enemy soldiers and civilians into mere objects devoid of moral
value. The departing assumption is that robotisation of warfare transforms
military operations into automated industrial processes with the aim of
removing empathy as a redundant ‘cost’. The development of autonomous
weapons systems raises a number of sharp ethical controversies related to
the projected moral insensitivity of robots regarding the treatment of
enemies and civilian population. The futurist vision of war as a foreign
policy instrument entirely ‘purified’ of the risk of morally wrong actions
is in opposition with the negative effects of the use of drones. The author
concludes that the use of lethal robots in combat would eventually remove
enemy soldiers and civilians from the realm of ethical reasoning and deprive
them of human dignity. Decision to kill in military operations ought to be
based on human conscience as the only proper framework of making decisions
by reasoning whether an action is right or wrong. [Project of the Serbian
Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no.
OI179029: Serbia in contemporary international relations: The strategic directions of
development and consolidation of the position of Serbia in international
integration - foreign policy, economics, legal and security perspectives] |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 0353-5738 2334-8577 |