Telerobotically operated and semiautonomous machines have become a major component in the arsenals of industrial nations around the world. By the year 2015 the United States military plans to have one-third of their combat aircraft and ground vehicles robotically controlled. Although there are many reasons for the use of robots on the battlefield, perhaps one of the most interesting assertions are that these machines, if properly designed and used, will result in a more just and ethical implementation of warfare. This (...) paper will focus on these claims by looking at what has been discovered about the capability of humans to behave ethically on the battlefield, and then comparing those findings with the claims made by robotics researchers that their machines are able to behave more ethically on the battlefield than human soldiers. Throughout the paper we will explore the philosophical critique of this claim and also look at how the robots of today are impacting our ability to fight wars in a just manner. (shrink)

Half-truths lie notoriously at the heart of publicly indulged instances of rationalization and excuse-making. Politicians and administrators, for example, explain away failed policies or even overt malfeasance by snatching at some particle of truth, some ostensibly saving grace. A halftruth articulated – the nominal truth – covers what I shall henceforth refer to as a sleeping truth – a truth that can lie in both senses of the word. We let a sleeping truth lie undisturbed, without proper examination or scrutiny, (...) and sometimes we let it lie in the matter of helping underwrite a deception: the policy or malfeasance was not, after all, that bad. Even when we discern the sleeping truth, we let the halftruth stand, because the one proffering it is like us – fallibly human, pressed for time perhaps or an unfortunate victim of circumstance. Sometimes the effort of calling a spade a spade may be forgone simply because there is not enough morally at stake. (shrink)