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I think that the general fear is that war will turn into a 'video game' played by a bunch of people in a secure warehouse in middle America. This will remove th
by pyre 14y ago
I think that the general fear is that war will turn into a 'video game' played by a bunch of people in a secure warehouse in middle America. This will remove the human aspect of what is going on at the other end of the controls, and we'll be less likely to get 'soldiers' doing things like questioning orders.
- Klinky 14y agoIsn't that already how war has been fought for most of the last century? The people making major decisions are rarely on the front line.
- pyre 14y agoThe "soldiers questioning orders" usually refers to the grunts questioning the orders of the higher-ups. You seem to be referring to generals making high-level decisions far-removed from the battlefield.
- Dove 14y agoI think that's a rather silly fear. If the targets on your screen were real people, would you not take the situation seriously? Or, let's put it another way. Bombers don't interface with targets personally; they're on the screen. Fighter pilots, too, for the most part. Artillery? Definitely. How about SAM operators? All they see is radar blips. Cruise missiles? ICBMs? People have to operate and launch those. How about an AWACS doing command and control? Their screens look like Starcraft with crappy graphics. Do any of these people see themselves as gamers rather than soldiers? I don't know any who do. The gravity of the situation comes from knowing that you're really involved in combat. Not from how good the graphics are.
- politician 14y agoThe Milgram experiment [1] showed that people who perceived themselves to under the influence of an authority will hurt other people when told to do so. The idea that soldiers are immune to this effect is irrational; in reality, this influence is probably a factor in their training regimes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment
- mc32 14y agoThis concern would affect all combatants --it's not something which would only influence drone pilots, so this objection is beside the point
- politician 14y agoThe parent's premise that drone operators will act humanely because "the people on the screen are real" has been shown to be invalid.
- Dove 14y agoNot at all. I said that there are already soldiers in the situation where their targets are lights on a screen, and they already treat the situation with the appropriate gravity. I claimed that drones wouldn't change that. Milgram proves too much. It should prove those soldiers callous as well, and they are not. Heck, it should prove any soldier callous, and they certainly are not. As I explained above, soldiers have training the subjects in milgram didn't.
- pekk 14y agoDo bomber operators act more humanely?
- Dove 14y agoSoldiers, at least in our military, are also trained to counter this effect: they take an oath to obey lawful orders, and they know they have a duty to disobey unlawful orders. In fact, the modern soldier knows that if he obeys an illegal order, he can be prosecuted for it. This experiment hasn't been done, to my knowledge, but how do you think milgram would have gone if they had begun the experiment by explaining the difference between ethical and unethical orders, and telling people they could be prosecuted for following the unethical ones? Most normal people haven't thought that through, and are unprepared to make that kind of decision. But soldiers have. Like a doctor professionally worries about malpractice, a soldier spends his entire career thinking that through.
- pekk 14y agoAs opposed to a 'video game' played by people sitting in cockpits very high in the sky.