First time accepted submitter KublaCant writes “‘At this very moment, researchers around the world – including in the United States – are working to develop fully autonomous war machines: killer robots. This is not science fiction. It is a real and powerful threat to humanity.’ These are the first words of a Human Rights Watch Petition to Presdient Obama to keep robots from the battlefield. The argument is that robots possess neither common sense, ‘real’ reason, any sense of mercy nor — most important — the option to not obey illegal commands. What with the fast-spreading use of drones et al. , we are allegedly a long way off from Asimov’s famous Three Laws of Robotics being implanted in autonomous fighting machines, or into any ( semi- ) autonomous robot. A ‘Stop the Killer Robots’ campaign will also be launched in April at the British House of Commons and includes many of the groups that successfully campaigned to have international action taken against cluster bombs and landmines. They hope to get a similar global treaty against autonomous weapons. The Guardian has more about this, including quotes from well-known robotics researcher Noel Sharkey from Sheffield University.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read the original:
Human Rights Watch: Petition Against Robots On the Battle Field
No offense to James Earl Jones, but I can’t imagine how anybody could watch the above video of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s little known tryout in the role of Darth Vader, and not see he makes the superior Sith Lord. I mean, it’s not even close. Come on, George. You know you have one more Special Edition left in you before you go. Tell you what — you include this vocal track, and I’ll forgive you for inserting Jar Jar into all the Dagobah scenes, or whatever other nonsense you had planned before we fanboys drove you screaming into retirement. More » 
