The Ethical Robot License – Tackling open robotics liability headaches

At We Robot 2013 Diana Cooper, a JD Candidate at the University of Ottawa, presented her attempt to tackle the open source headache by proposing a new license called the Ethical Robot License (ERL). In her paper, A Licensing Approach to Regulation of Open Robotics, Cooper presents ERL as “a licensing approach to allocate liability between manufacturers and users and promote ethical and non-harmful use of open robots”.

Let’s all stop killer robots, shall we?

In November of last year, Human Rights Watch (HRW) and the International Human Rights Clinic (IHRC) at Harvard Law School jointly published a 50-page report on the topic of killer robots.

Earlier this week, on April 23, a new global campaign named the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots was launched with the very idea of stopping killer robots. Composed of over twenty international NGOs in ten countries, the campaign’s focus is to ban the development, production and use of future lethal robot weapons or “killer robots” that could autonomously locate and neutralize human targets.

We Robot 2013: Getting down to Business

Last year about this time, I had just finished defending her MASc thesis and had flown to Miami for the We Robot 2012 conference, hosted by the University of Miami.
Today, I am at Stanford Law …

Military Robotics

Based on panel presentation at We Robot 2012. Moderator: Bernard H. Oxman.

When Machines Kill: Criminal Responsibility for International Crimes Committed by Lethal Autonomous Robots, Oren Gross
Asleep at the Switch? How Lethal Autonomous Robots Become a Force Multiplier …

The Prospect of Expert Robots

Discussion notes from the presentation of Ian Kerr and Jason Millar on “Delegation, Relinquishment and Responsibility: The Prospect of Expert Robots”
Expert robots are coming (e.g., IBM’s Watson, Google Search Engine).
What are the issues?

Increasing reliance on this …

The Prospect of Expert Robots

Discussion notes from the presentation of Ian Kerr and Jason Millar on “Delegation, Relinquishment and Responsibility: The Prospect of Expert Robots”
Expert robots are coming (e.g., IBM’s Watson, Google Search Engine).
What are the issues?

Increasing reliance on …

Micro Aerial Vehicles: Opportunity Or Liability

Based on a demo presentation by Amir Rahmani.
Drones in NationaAirSpace: 295 special flight permits by FAA.
FAA’s NextGen Program

Moving from operator-based traffic control to automated system routing the aircrafts
Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcast (ADS-B) to be installed …

Machine Agency

Based on We Robot 2012 discussion of J Storrs Hall on “Machine Agency: a Philosophical and Technological Roadmap” (discussant: Peter Asaro)
What is it about?

Determinism, will, punishment and moral agency
Causal determinism (a Laplacian definition) vs Quantum Uncertainty
Open vs …

Social Issues in Robotics

Discussion notes based on the presentation of the following papers at We Robot 2012 panel session moderated by M. Ryan Calo:
- Extending Legal Rights to Social Robots, Kate Darling
- Sex Robots and Roboticization of Consent, Sinziana Gutiu
- Liar Liar …

Regulating Liability for Risks of Physical Injury

Discussion notes based on the presentation of the following paper at We Robot 2012:
Patrick Hubbard on “Regulation of Liability for Risks of Physical Injury From ‘Sophisticated Robots’”
Please free and help foster the discussion by editing …