Digital Saber Rattling: Artificial Intelligence, Power and Peace

The current technological moment we are in has seen AI integrated into nearly every facet of human life. Warfare is no different, as Automated Weapon Systems (AWS) are being developed and deployed in combat zones, such as Israel's Lavender system and the US's MUTT robots, posing significant challenges to existing just war theory and military doctrine. But whether the issue is China's development of advanced cyberspace weapons, US UAVs or Israel's advanced targeting systems, each new weapon or weapons system bears the trace of the long-standing military-industrial complex. Thus, the so-called AI race has become an AI arms race, where AI dominance is tied to geopolitical dominance a la Cold War politics.

To the degree that countries like the US and China develop advanced AI weapons, they deprive their populations of resources that could be used for better aims. Thus, a critical problem at this juncture is this: the wealth and power tied to AI development used for military prowess further enforces international antagonisms while promoting an uneasy peace through AI brinksmanship. However, as numerous science fiction stories have prophesied, an artificial intelligence given power over weapons may be more disastrous than human control of powerful weapons.

It is important, then, to find a way out. The situation today demonstrates Herbert Marcuse's notion of one dimensionality, when the interests of government, military, industry, sciences, and so on are wrapped into a system of total administration. Drawing from Marcuse's work, his student Andrew Feenberg proposes the need for democratic interventions of technologies. New imaginaries are needed to direct powerful AI tools to humanly good ends, and coordinated efforts are needed to resist the push AI designers and promoters to good ends. This remains a significant challenge, but one necessary for directing AI to the aims of peace.