San Francisco to allow police 'killer robots'

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

clearspira, I'm thinking you were meaning to say that it's an example of the slippery slope associated with the social movement of "defund the police"?

Being a police officer is safer now than it ever has been. The problem is that everyone seems to have so gotten used to the idea that the job should be less dangerous that people now seem to expect it to have *no* danger.

I would think that police institutions are tightening their conduct to give officers less discretion as to when to apply state sanctioned aggression.

can you elaborate.

For instance, when people are stealing food because they're hungry, a lot of people recognize that as a pretty strongly motivating factor in someone's self judgement. Police/security conduct that inevitably leads to substantial harm towards the assailant, as carried out department-wide, can come off as overbearing.

[Madner Kami]

Let me remind you of your words, when you ever end up in a hostage situation, where blowing up a wall or creating a distraction would solve the situation. There are plenty of situations where a machine like that is useful. For example in a case of a controlled explosion of an explosive device and so on and on.

Why exactly is the exploding robot necessary for the former when setting explosives manually is an option with far less potential to be used in other, more abusive applications. Similarly, while controlled explosions are certainly a thing, are the proposed payloads on these robots actually the sort that are useful for that, with the kinds of bombs likely to be set by civilians, and are said civilian-grade bombs actually of a kind where controlled explosions are a better solution than existing bomb-diffusing drones. And for either, why are these robots being purchased for the SFPD and not a separate, multi-district specialist unit for bombing applications.

Like setting aside the question of whether robots are the best means of achieving these ends, the larger issue is that police departments are simply not to be trusted with such things. Past behavior of every PD in the entire US suggests their most likely use case would be blowing holes in the houses of suspects who refuse them entry, followed by using the exploding drones for crowd dispersal.

Your problem is your police, not non-autonomous robots. I suggest channeling your energies accordingly, rather than fighting another misdirected, costly and ultimately pointless proxy war.

[CmdrKing]

It is not an issue with my particular police, but with any police having them. The proper goals of the police and the use cases for these devices are incompatible, because they make magnificent tools of oppression far more easily than they do tools of public safety.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

It is not an issue with my particular police, but with any police having them. The proper goals of the police and the use cases for these devices are incompatible, because they make magnificent tools of oppression far more easily than they do tools of public safety.

I believe he means yours as in the United States (or, cities within the United States to be specific). The case being that he is from Germany.

So his argument therein would be, fix your culture and get more honest policemen on the force so that it becomes a non-issue.

[Madner Kami]

It is not an issue with my particular police, but with any police having them. The proper goals of the police and the use cases for these devices are incompatible, because they make magnificent tools of oppression far more easily than they do tools of public safety.

I believe he means yours as in the United States (or, cities within the United States to be specific). The case being that he is from Germany.

So his argument therein would be, fix your culture and get more honest policemen on the force so that it becomes a non-issue.

Almost correct. I was adressing both CmdrKing as an individual, as well as a US-citizen. German police isn't perfect either, but nobody cries havoc when the bomb disposal unit comes and unloads what's essentially a Goliath. In fact, this happens quite often, thanks to World War 2 remnants being burried in our soil.

[CmdrKing]

I'm aware. What I'm saying is that the specific corruption of your police force isn't at issue, but the sorts of things a police force should be doing or be called upon to do are at odds with "and we have an exploding robot"

[Madner Kami]

I'm aware. What I'm saying is that the specific corruption of your police force isn't at issue, but the sorts of things a police force should be doing or be called upon to do are at odds with "and we have an exploding robot"

99% of police-work is. 1% may not and they should have that tool at hand, when it's needed. The fact that it may be misused is an issue, obviously, but that issue isn't solved by keeping it out of their hands. That can only be solved by fixing the police itself and that isn't accomplished by not allowing them to use this particular tool.

[Dragon Ball Fan]

I know I have gotten in trouble for talking about this stuff but I will just make this one post.

I get the fear of what will be done with these robots but if cops kill lots of innocent people because they fear for their lives, why would they use the robots to kill someone when they obviously, would not have that fear?

And if robots can remove the risk of death from ANY profession, why not use them?

[CmdrKing]

I'm aware. What I'm saying is that the specific corruption of your police force isn't at issue, but the sorts of things a police force should be doing or be called upon to do are at odds with "and we have an exploding robot"

99% of police-work is. 1% may not and they should have that tool at hand, when it's needed. The fact that it may be misused is an issue, obviously, but that issue isn't solved by keeping it out of their hands. That can only be solved by fixing the police itself and that isn't accomplished by not allowing them to use this particular tool.

If you are sending police into scenarios where the exploding robot is the best tool for the job, you have overextended and misused your police force in precisely the ways that enables and exacerbates police corruption.

[Madner Kami]

SWAT isn't considered police?