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Ethical questions aside: Probably because you’d end up with an AI that would do something that fulfilled its training criteria, but didn’t really reflect the r

Ethical questions aside: Probably because you’d end up with an AI that would do something that fulfilled its training criteria, but didn’t really reflect the real desired outcome, like that Tetris AI that just paused the game when it realised it was going to lose. Or the AI would suggest attacking unacceptable non-military targets, or inflict collateral damage, or suggest nuking the enemy as a first strike. AI might be an interesting tool for wargaming, but it’s never going to be a complete strategy guide. I’d say that AI is used extensively throughout the defence industry in specific areas though, and I’m fairly confident wargaming is one of them. But there are people who have context the AI will lack at all points in the chain. You wouldn’t just have some AI ordering troops about.

skissane 6y ago
> Or the AI would suggest attacking unacceptable non-military targets, or inflict collateral damage I would expect the people who wrote the AI would impose on it constraints to avoid this – to be useful in the real world, an AI has to comply with the same constraints that real world military commanders have to follow, and the laws of war are among those (certainly if we are talking about the US military.) (A realistic risk is that it might interpret those rules differently than a human would – maybe in an overly pedantic manner – and its overly pedantic readings of the rules might give human commanders cover or encouragement to engage in the same harmful pedantry.) > or suggest nuking the enemy as a first strike I doubt they'd even give an AI that option to consider. Realistically if you are a US military commander – in Afghanistan or Iraq or Syria or wherever the US might intervene next – that's not an option on the menu. The decision to use nuclear weapons only comes from the very top, and the very top will only consider it in utterly dire circumstances. To be actually a useful tool to military commanders, you want an AI which suggests to them strategies they might not have thought of, or which gives them a reasoned opinion on which of the various options they are considering is most advisable. A useful AI tells them how to use the resources they have, and nuclear weapons are not–in normal circumstances–an available resource to US military operations.
- Teever 6y ago
  > I would expect the people who wrote the AI would impose on it constraints to avoid this The devil is in the details. What if the AI decides that the course of action that leads to the desired outcome of winning the conflict is to kill civilians but it is also aware that outright killing civilians is against the law or will be ignored by the decision making human so it instead decides to recommend a series of strikes that indirectly lead to a large famine which results in the death of the civilians and winning the conflict? Who is to blame there? Is this outcome desirable?
  - mpalmer 6y ago
    They sort of address this - "To be actually a useful tool to military commanders, you want an AI which [...] gives them a reasoned opinion on which of the various options they are considering is most advisable." With that (far more sophisticated) AI system, leadership could just de-prioritize options with excessive risk of civilian casualty.
    - skissane 6y ago
      The other day I was looking at this – http://www.datalex.org/ http://www.datalex.org/ [0] – presented with a situation, it asks you questions about it, and then generates a legal opinion on your situation. It shows all its reasoning (in natural language) to arrive at that legal opinion. That's the same basic thing a human advisor does – if you get a formal legal opinion from a lawyer, it doesn't just give you the conclusion, it also explains the arguments and reasoning and considerations it used to arrive at that conclusion. So I don't see why a strategic military advice platform couldn't do the same basic thing. [0] Here's a working example: http://beta.datalex.org/app/?rulebase=http://austlii.community/wiki/DataLex/ForeignRelationsActKB http://beta.datalex.org/app/?rulebase=http://austlii.communi...
      - dorgo 6y ago
        It sound more like a prolog program. It takes a set of rules and facts and can infer other facts from there and show you all the steps of the process. Although it is a branch of AI it is not what one thinks of nowdays hearing the term AI. One thinks of some fancy powerful self learning black box, which can do miracles but can't explain how it does it.
anonporridge 6y ago
> AI might be an interesting tool for wargaming, but it’s never going to be a complete strategy guide. Never is a strong word.
lumost 6y ago
curiously - using an AI for Red Air/wargaming seems like an exceptionally good use case for AI that is pretty good most of the time, and pretty random at other times. As a preparation activity you want to be prepped for both perfect play opponents and imperfect opponents that do crazy things like nuke first. Arguably such a system would also help eliminate bias in (pretend) adversarial commanders.

skissane 6y ago

> Or the AI would suggest attacking unacceptable non-military targets, or inflict collateral damage I would expect the people who wrote the AI would impose on it constraints to avoid this – to be useful in the real world, an AI has to comply with the same constraints that real world military commanders have to follow, and the laws of war are among those (certainly if we are talking about the US military.) (A realistic risk is that it might interpret those rules differently than a human would – maybe in an overly pedantic manner – and its overly pedantic readings of the rules might give human commanders cover or encouragement to engage in the same harmful pedantry.) > or suggest nuking the enemy as a first strike I doubt they'd even give an AI that option to consider. Realistically if you are a US military commander – in Afghanistan or Iraq or Syria or wherever the US might intervene next – that's not an option on the menu. The decision to use nuclear weapons only comes from the very top, and the very top will only consider it in utterly dire circumstances. To be actually a useful tool to military commanders, you want an AI which suggests to them strategies they might not have thought of, or which gives them a reasoned opinion on which of the various options they are considering is most advisable. A useful AI tells them how to use the resources they have, and nuclear weapons are not–in normal circumstances–an available resource to US military operations.

Teever 6y ago
> I would expect the people who wrote the AI would impose on it constraints to avoid this The devil is in the details. What if the AI decides that the course of action that leads to the desired outcome of winning the conflict is to kill civilians but it is also aware that outright killing civilians is against the law or will be ignored by the decision making human so it instead decides to recommend a series of strikes that indirectly lead to a large famine which results in the death of the civilians and winning the conflict? Who is to blame there? Is this outcome desirable?
- mpalmer 6y ago
  They sort of address this - "To be actually a useful tool to military commanders, you want an AI which [...] gives them a reasoned opinion on which of the various options they are considering is most advisable." With that (far more sophisticated) AI system, leadership could just de-prioritize options with excessive risk of civilian casualty.
  - skissane 6y ago
    The other day I was looking at this – http://www.datalex.org/ http://www.datalex.org/ [0] – presented with a situation, it asks you questions about it, and then generates a legal opinion on your situation. It shows all its reasoning (in natural language) to arrive at that legal opinion. That's the same basic thing a human advisor does – if you get a formal legal opinion from a lawyer, it doesn't just give you the conclusion, it also explains the arguments and reasoning and considerations it used to arrive at that conclusion. So I don't see why a strategic military advice platform couldn't do the same basic thing. [0] Here's a working example: http://beta.datalex.org/app/?rulebase=http://austlii.community/wiki/DataLex/ForeignRelationsActKB http://beta.datalex.org/app/?rulebase=http://austlii.communi...
    - dorgo 6y ago
      It sound more like a prolog program. It takes a set of rules and facts and can infer other facts from there and show you all the steps of the process. Although it is a branch of AI it is not what one thinks of nowdays hearing the term AI. One thinks of some fancy powerful self learning black box, which can do miracles but can't explain how it does it.

anonporridge 6y ago

> AI might be an interesting tool for wargaming, but it’s never going to be a complete strategy guide. Never is a strong word.

lumost 6y ago

curiously - using an AI for Red Air/wargaming seems like an exceptionally good use case for AI that is pretty good most of the time, and pretty random at other times. As a preparation activity you want to be prepped for both perfect play opponents and imperfect opponents that do crazy things like nuke first. Arguably such a system would also help eliminate bias in (pretend) adversarial commanders.