ABSTRACT
The aim of this concluding chapter is to reflect on common themes that run throughout this book, as well as to highlight some additional issues and research challenges. The first issue critically discussed is the debate on ‘killer robots’. Secondly, a critical discussion on the various definitions of the concept of ‘autonomy’ is carried out, resulting in an argument for the concept of ‘bounded autonomy’ which states that the capacity of a system to display autonomous behavior is very limited compared with the variety of the environments to which adaptation is required. This leads to a discussion of the concept of ‘meaningful human control’. The argument is that more attention to the testing, evaluation, and certification process of weapon systems is required, rather than to the control exercised by individual commanders or operators. Finally, research challenges in the field of Human Factors and Ergonomics are formulated, in the context of Responsible AI for military systems.
