Calls to ban killer robots ignore the fact that human soldiers can make lethal mistakes. If driverless cars will save lives, perhaps armed machines can as well

Armed and dangerous Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images

NEXT week, a meeting at UN headquarters in Geneva will discuss autonomous armed robots. Unlike existing military drones, which are controlled remotely, these new machines would identify and attack targets without human intervention. Groups including the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots hope the meeting will lead to an international ban.

But while fiction is littered with cautionary tales of what happens when you put guns in the cold, metallic hands of a machine, the situation may not be as simple as “human good, robots bad”.

To understand why, we should look at what people …