THEATRE OF WAR: LAW

Theatre of War: Law Gouache on paper 56 x 76 cm 2022

LEGAL AI

I read a report "VISIMO and West Point Advancing Artificial Intelligence for Judge Advocates" [January 11, 2022] which provides a brief outline of research conducted to develop an AI enabled legal assistant for the military. Not surprisingly speed is the compelling issue. Here's a quote from the report, 

With the development of autonomous weapons, the speed of warfare is increasing. Stationed at combatant commands and Air Operations Centers worldwide, Judge Advocate General (JAG) Corps members provide critical legal advice during combat, including use-of-force decision-making recommendations. However, Judge Advocates are not equipped to keep pace with modern combat.

SPEED

As regular readers know, I have been interested in the issue of speed and war, speed and technology, interconnectivity and inter-operability, for some time. I often refer to cultural critic Paul Virilio's various statements and ideas about speed, particularly the harnessing of light speed [or near light speed]. In regards to AI legal assistants/lawyers, embedded into the Internet of Battlefield Things speed saves time. In doing so, in an interconnected & interoperable system, speed acts as a force multiplier. Whatever is speeded up becomes part of this force multiplication. 

Speed has become an enabler, a tactic and a strategy. It is a purveyor of weaponry, but could also be considered a weapon itself. Speed could also be considered a domain - inspired by Virilio, I call it a dromo-domain. 

Theatre of War: Law 

This painting (top of page) was directly inspired by the article mentioned above. Like some other recent paintings I visualise a 'cloud' of circles as a parody of The Cloud, the Internet of Things, the Internet of Battlefield Things, The Internet of War Things. My 'clouds' can also be interpreted as revelatory landscapes of the normally invisible ie: the connections enabled by technological interconnectivity and interoperability. These landscapes could also be pre-emptive counter-maps, surveying and revealing bourgeoning techno-colonising forces. Like many of my paintings, the viewer can imagine soaring beyond, below, behind and in front of these techno-scapes. This is an act of what I call imaginational metaveillance. 

In Theatre of War: Law the central circle is a string of painted binary code 'instructing' MILITARY LAWYER. This circle is connected to an array of circles, some created using the symbol for light speed (c)  and one circle created with the symbol for photon (y). My use of these scientific symbols references the fact that all frequencies in the electromagnetic spectrum are made up of photons, travelling at the speed of light. The light spectrum is the only frequency we can see with the naked eye. 

The circles clearly extend beyond the painting, thus the central MILITARY LAWYER circle may not ultimately be central at all - is there, in fact, a centre point in an always-on interconnected and interoperable system where civilian and military assets and activities intersect? This poses questions about command and responsibility - as Virilio notes “acceleration of reality tends to reverse the principle of responsibility”.[1]

Detail Theatre of War: Law

I will leave you to ponder more. Because, of course, there are many other issues associated with AI, such as bias, unintended outcomes, accidents, nuance, and more. Time will tell how these issues will be dealt with by the developers of an AI legal tool designed to operate in fast moving battle, war, conflict situations.

Cheers,

Kathryn 

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[1] Paul Virilio, The Original Accident, trans. Julie Rose (London and Malden, MA: Polity, 2007), 90.