US seeks assurance from China and Russia that AI will never control their nuclear weapons

[midian182]

What just happened? If you think the prospect of artificial intelligence controlling fighter jets, drones, and machine gun turrets is concerning, think about the potential ramifications of AI making decisions on the deployment of nuclear weapons. The US is one of the countries that has declared control over nukes will also rest in human hands, and it wants China and Russia to make the same promise.

State Department arms control official Paul Dean told an online briefing that Washington has made a "clear and strong commitment" to keep humans in control of nuclear weapons, not AI. Dean added that both Britain and France have made the same commitment.

"We would welcome a similar statement by China and the Russian Federation," said Dean, via Reuters. "We think it is an extremely important norm of responsible behaviour and we think it is something that would be very welcome in a P5 context." P5 is a reference to the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council: China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

China and the US resumed nuclear weapons discussions in January, though formal arms control negotiations could take time. The Asian nation, which is expanding its nuclear weapons capabilities, said that the largest nuclear-capable countries should negotiate a no-first-use treaty between each other.

Russia's nuclear weapons have been especially worrying since its invasion of Ukraine. President Vladimir Putin said in February 2023 that he was suspending participation in the START treaty, an agreement between Russia and the US to reduce and limit their nuclear arsenals and allow the nations to inspect each others' nuclear weapons facilities.

AI-controlled weapons are advancing at a frightening pace. Last month brought news that the US Air Force successfully tested a fighter jet flown by AI in dogfights against human pilots. There were similar stories last year, including US plans to counter the China threat with a massive AI-powered fleet of autonomous drones and systems. We also heard about Israel's increasing use of these weapons.

Elon Musk was one of many experts who called for a ban on AI-controlled weapons in 2017. In response, the army said that the final decision to engage a target always rests with humans, not machines.

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US seeks assurance from China and Russia that AI will never control their nuclear weapons

 

[Uncle Al]

The smartest thing we could do is develop a means & method to turn AI off from other systems. Only a fool would think China & Russia could be trusted to follow through on anything remotely like this.

 

[Watzupken]

Humans or AI, it makes no difference. After all, isn’t AI getting all their “knowledge” from humans? So having weapons of destruction with humans or AI is probably the same.

 

[Uncle Al]

The smartest thing we could do is develop a means & method to turn AI off from other systems. Only a fool would think China & Russia could be trusted to follow through on anything remotely like this.

 

[Starfals]

Humans or AI, it makes no difference. After all, isn’t AI getting all their “knowledge” from humans? So having weapons of destruction with humans or AI is probably the same.

Yeah, but there are bugs, issues, and hacks/fake information. I know some of these can affect people too... but still. No system is perfect today, no matter for what it's being used. Do we really want the whole world to end cus of a bug? Not even Skynet or a real war? Literally a glitch? People might end up until the last sec to verify if its a real war going on or not. What if it's a test and not the real deal? AI might just nuke the whole world without thinking, as soon as it thinks it's time to do it. It won't care if it ends up all human(and all other kind) life, and people do. Anyways, this is just a horrible mistake waiting to happen and I know China won't care about it cus they are huge fans of AI. I do wonder what Russia thinks about this tho.

 

[kira setsu]

I mean if the US is asking that means they probably did mull over about AI running their own nukes already,

pretty much everyone will answer "correctly" while lying directly to each others faces.

 

[redgarl]

Well, the only way to be sure about it is to get rid of all the nukes... but that will never happen...

 

[toooooot]

Russian AI cant be much worse than the regime that already is responsible for millions killed within its 30 years of rule.
Some of you probably wondered, where did I get millions.
Chechnya and its capital bombed to the ground. Syria and its cities including bombed to the ground.
I swear, the only reason Russia is not bombing Ukraine to the ground is because 1. Ukraine still has anti air defense, and 2. if it somehow they did, the west would give Ukraine enough weapons to do the same with Moscow.
Cowards only understand strength. And when they find none, they do as the rest of their kind. That is rob rape kill.

 

[Robbie K]

The smartest thing we could do is develop a means & method to turn AI off from other systems. Only a fool would think China & Russia could be trusted to follow through on anything remotely like this.

Yeah I don't really get why not trusting Russia and China isn't obvious. Like even the whole "new start" treaty between Russia and the US is peculiar, as if Russia would comply. Don't get it.

 

[Dysnomia]

The smartest thing we could do is develop a means & method to turn AI off from other systems. Only a fool would think China & Russia could be trusted to follow through on anything remotely like this.

Computers do not have worries, fear, suspicions, understanding of war, etc. This has saved us time and time again. For example https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/oct/27/vasili-arkhipov-stopped-nuclear-war and https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2021/02/able-archer-nuclear-war-reagan.html

 

[ScottSoapbox]

It's somewhat terrifying that we even need to verify this is the universal policy.

(But most politicians aren't very bright, so it's probably not a bad idea.)

 

[lapuinkafabio]

Too late, see this https://www.ga.com/

 

[Endymio]

Some of you probably wondered, where did I get millions.
Chechnya and its capital bombed to the ground. Syria and its cities including bombed to the ground.

The US killed 600,000 people in Iraq alone, looking for WMD that didn't exist, and after the UN refused to authorize US action. As for Syria, the US has dropped far more bombs in the country than Russia has -- and, unlike Russia, the US invaded Syria with the express purpose of toppling its democratically-elected government. The US has remained in the country a full decade now, bombing pretty much whatever it wishes, despite continual calls from the country's official government to withdraw. Oh, and let's not forget US ally Israel, which just bombed an diplomatic embassy in Syria, an act which is a war crime and a violation of three separate treaties to which both the US and Israel are signatory.

 

[Endymio]

Computers do not have worries, fear, suspicions, understanding of war, etc. This has saved us time and time again.

It's a good point. Most people don't realize that the closest the world has come to a nuclear launch since WW2 was during the '73 Yom Kippur war, when nuclear missiles were rolled to launch position, and the individual field-level commanders given the activation codes and told to launch a retaliatory strike if they lost contact with Tel Aviv. Had any one of those commanders gone rogue, or had a communications line failed, many millions of civilians could have died.