The debate over whether lethal autonomous weapon systems (LAWS) – often called ‘killer robots’ – should be banned continues, although it’s far from settled.
Should future wars be fought by autonomous systems? Or do they pose such a threat that they should be banned? These issues are being debated this week by diplomats from around the world.
Though set “a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away,” it isn’t hard to see in the Star Wars films a vision of our own not so distant future. But Anthony Jones, a physician with a long background in health…
In Australia, there are reports that up to half a million of existing jobs could be taken over by robotics or machines run by artificial intelligence. So with smarter computers taking on more of the work…
Don’t be mesmerised by cool apps and flashy new gizmos – the top technology inventions of the year are ones that will have a lasting effect. Most are advances in fields that are already changing us. Some…
Your autonomous vacuum cleaner cleans your floors and there is no great harm if it occasionally bounces into things or picks up a button or a scrap of paper with a phone number. But then again this latter…
Lost and thirsty in the Australian bush, Outback Joe waited eight years. And finally, in September this year, he was found – by a flying robot. Outback Joe is not a real person, but for a week each September…
How do you rate your chances of completing a transcontinental road trip? What if you can’t drive and don’t have car? What if you can’t even move unaided? In fact, what about if you’re not even human? Tweeting…
There is something magical about seeing 1,000 robots move, when humans are not operating any of them. In a new study published in Science, researchers have achieved just that. This swarm of 1,000 robots…
The whistle has just been blown on one of the most thrilling events on the international sporting calendar. It took place in Brazil and pitted teams from all over the world against each other, each hoping…
Germany may have won this year’s World Cup but Australia’s robot researchers have emerged victorious from a subtly different competition. The University of New South Wales’ rUNSWift robot team claimed…
Robots, and autonomous systems in general, can cause anxiety and uncertainty, particularly as their use in everyday tasks becomes a more immediate possibility. In order to lessen at least some of that…
High-tech robots called PackBots will be unleashed during the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil to help boost security and examine suspicious objects. The Brazilian government purportedly spent US$7.2 million…
James Dyson’s decision to fund a robotics laboratory at Imperial College London may not lead to the super advanced robot friends of our dreams, but what he has planned could make robotic domestic appliances…
January is a time when many of us seek to better ourselves. We want to learn a new skill or improve an existing one. A network designed especially for robots, RoboEarth, is being tested in the Netherlands…
The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots, a network of NGOs and academics, has done us all a valuable service by drawing attention to the development of unmanned systems that are able to kill without direct…