Robotics developer Boston Dynamics has a reputation for making robots that jump, crawl and run, sharing online videos of its creations that veer between impressive in their capabilities and hilarious in their limitations – but always terrifying in their potential.
Though it’s amusing to watch the company’s Atlas humanoid robot dance a jig or stumble attempting parkour, strap a gun to it and the laughs cease. And Boston Dynamics doesn’t want to see that happen.
The Massachusetts-based firm is one of six industry leaders, alongside Agility Robotics, ANYbotics, Clearpath Robotics, Open Robotics and Unitree, that jointly published an open letter pledging not to weaponise their general-purpose robots and asking customers to do the same.
“We believe that adding weapons to robots that are remotely or autonomously operated, widely available to the public, and capable of navigating to previously inaccessible locations where people live and work, raises new risks of harm and serious ethical issues,” the letter stated. “Weaponised applications of these newly capable robots will also harm public trust in the technology in ways that damage the tremendous benefits they will bring to society. For these reasons, we do not support the weaponisation of our advanced-mobility general-purpose robots.”
The firms believe their robots should be used to benefit society,
