Should We Ban Killer Robots?

Images of killer robots are the stuff of science fiction – but also, increasingly, of scientific fact on the battlefield. Should we be worried, or is this a normal development in the technology of war?

In this accessible volume ethicist Deane Baker cuts through the confusion over whether lethal autonomous weapons – so-called killer robots – should be banned. Setting aside unhelpful analogies taken from science fiction, Baker looks instead to our understanding of mercenaries (the metaphorica...