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Ukraine has become a live-fire test range for AI drones like the Bumblebee, provided by a secretive Eric Schmidt-led venture, raising alarms in Kremlin circles (www.nytimes.com)
submitted 7 months ago by to c/hardware@lemmy.world
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[–] 12 points 7 months ago (2 children)

I strongly disagree with this framing.

I live in Ukraine and I am only happy to see better drone technology for fighting the russians. Every time you walk in the centre of Kyiv you see the memorial for many thousands of fallen soldiers right on the main square of the country. Any technology that saves lives and kills more russian invaders is a good thing.

If one doesn't want this tech to be misused, then the citizens of a given country need to deal with local oligarchs, corruption and crime.

In the case of the US (just one notable example out of many thousands), this would be arresting Mark Zuckerburg and his goons for enabling mass scale fraud that netted them $16B in 2024 alone.

And the scam run by Meta is the tip of the iceberg. I don't support capital punishment, but for the ennoblement of the Rohingya genocide, it would be reasonable to consider an exception for Zuckerburg and other senior thugs in the Meta criminal gang.

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  • [–] 3 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    I don’t fear Zuckerberg using this technology, I fear the government using this technology.

    Everyone should. Autonomous weapons are not good for people.

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago

    My argument would be that the government is a representation of its citizens.

    It's up to each individual citizen to make the government work; be it with autonomous weapons or surveillance. Both have legitimate use cases and it is up to the voting public to make sure they are used responsibly.

    Even in developed democracies, only around 70% of the population votes and in the US it is closer to ~60%.

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  • [+] 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 child)
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  • [–] 4 points 7 months ago

    I am not naive enough to think it won't (I mean this in a practical way, i.e. hearing/seeing how Shaheds have evolved over the last ~3 years from my balcony).

    But I would much rather we get it to use it first and have a head start (not just usage but refinement) and maybe we'll even have a good 6-18 month lead period on somewhat semi-permanent basis.

    If one wants this technology to "disappear" [not be used], then one needs to address corruption in their own country in an outcome based manner and defend the international rules based order (by force if necessary).

    And yet we have Obama, the darling of the US centre right, calling the invasion of Crimea a "regional issue" back in 2014 or chickening out to strike Assad when he used chemical weapons (after an explicit warning that chemical weapons were a red line).

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