Blog 1: Ethical Frameworks
Published on:
Machine automated necropolitics.
News Article
‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza
The article is a contemporary example of the use of technology to produce more complex and destructive acts of war. Automation is now engaged in massive destruction with minimal human review (not that IDF officials are ethical actors) and little attention to collateral (how dare we call people collateral?).
The AI system “Lavender” scores Gazans (based on previously and illegally collected data) on likelihood of being suspected militatns. Unguided dumb bombs (less precise explosions) are reserved for junior militants to cut costs.
Not only is this technology erasing entire Palestinian communities, it will spread for other nationa states’ abuse.
Stakeholders:
Gazan civilians are descendants of or themselves refugees of the 1948 Nakba. Their dreams are to return to the dignity of their lands. They are frequently inside homes designated as targets.
Hamas militants, who are trying to reclaim lost land at all costs.
Israeli military, which wants to “secure Israel’s safety” at all costs.
Europe and the US, who materially benefit from the genocide but must keep a thin veneer of indignance.
Other nation states, who will model this death technology to use in their own wars.
I find the ethical frameworks listed more restrictive than helpful.
Utilitarianism: The IDF: kill Hamas militants without paying attention to civilians to secure Israel’s safety. Pay no attention why the militants exist (children of the Nakba), ignore intergenerational trauma and radicalisation effects, and the blatant disregard of international law. The statistical errors in false positives is also permissible. Hamas militants: the death of Gazans is permissible towards the goal of liberation.
Justice: A justice approach would reiterate the Palestinian’s right to reclaim their land. It would ask why Israel has the technology it has (through financial support from the US that could have gone to American households). Israel tests weapons on Palestinians to sell on the global market. A justice approach would historicise the issue and go back to its root, rather than treat its present in a vacuum.
This was difficult to write because I don’t have much to say. My professor once said that justice is the only universal, I believe her. I hope that one day the Americans around me will realise that they are imperialists, because if they know they never seem to show it.