The Ethical and Legal Significance of Super Soldiers

The creation and deployment of super soldiers raises serious ethical, legal, and technological questions for military researchers, private contractors, and most of all the soldiers charged with using their newfound powers responsibly. These include: Is the creation of super soldiers in the best interest of U.S. strategic defense, or does it risk worsening a global arms race? To what extent is soldier enhancement technologically feasible, and how should researchers go about developing and testing prospective enhancements? How does the creation or deployment of super soldiers—for humanitarian missions or armed conflict—square with existing Department of Defense policies and international laws governing sentient weaponry and human experimentation?

Join Penn’s Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law, the Annenberg Public Policy Center, and the University of Massachusetts Lowell for a panel discussion on the ethical and legal posture of soldier enhancements featuring experts in U.S. strategic defense and preparedness, the development and ethical evaluation of novel neural devices designed to augment human performance and behavior, and public policy surrounding emerging weapons technologies.

This keynote panel is open to the public and free of charge.

Panelists

General James Cartwright retired from active duty on 1 September 2011, after 40 years of service in the United States Marine Corps. General Cartwright served as Commander, U.S. Strategic Command, before being nominated and appointed as the 8th Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the nation’s second highest military officer. General Cartwright served his four-year tenure as Vice Chairman across two presidential administrations and constant military operations against diverse and evolving enemies. He became widely recognized for his technical acumen, vision of future national security concepts, and keen ability to integrate systems, organizations, and people in ways that encouraged creativity and sparked innovation in the areas of strategic deterrence, nuclear proliferation, missile defense, cyber security, and adaptive acquisition processes.

Dr. Laura Cabrera is the Dorothy Foehr Huck and J. Lloyd Huck Chair in Neuroethics. She is an Associate Professor of Engineering Science and Mechanics, and Philosophy at Penn State University. She is a Senior Research Associate at the Rock Ethics Institute, and affiliated with the Center for Neural Engineering. She is also Faculty Affiliate at Neuroethics Canada, University of British Columbia. She received a BEng in Electrical and Communication Engineering from the Instituto Tecnológico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) in Mexico City, an MA in Applied Ethics from Linköping University in Sweden, and a PhD in Applied Ethics from Charles Sturt University in Australia. Dr. Cabrera’s interests focus on the ethical and societal implications of neurotechnologies used for health and medicine, as well as for non-medical purposes.

Dr. Paul Scharre is the Vice President and Director of Studies at CNAS. He is the award-winning author of Four Battlegrounds: Power in the Age of Artificial Intelligence. His first book, Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War, won the 2019 Colby Award, was named one of Bill Gates’ top five books of 2018, and was named by The Economist one of the top five books to understand modern warfare. Scharre previously worked in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) where he played a leading role in establishing policies on unmanned and autonomous systems and emerging weapons technologies. He led the Department of Defense (DoD) working group that drafted DoD Directive 3000.09, establishing the department’s policies on autonomy in weapon systems. He also led DoD efforts to establish policies on intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance programs and directed energy technologies.

Moderator

Dr. Nicholas Evans is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. A 2020-2023 Greenwall Foundation Faculty Scholar, he currently conducts research on the ethics of emerging technologies, with a focus on national security issues. He is best known for his research on “dual-use research” in the life sciences and has recently begun work examining research ethics concerns arising from the performance enhancement of active military personnel, funded by the US Air Force Office of Scientific Research. Prior to his appointment at the University of Massachusetts, Evans completed postdoctoral research at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2015, he held an Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Initiative Fellowship at the UPMC Center for Health Security, Baltimore. He also previously served as a policy officer with the Australian Department of Health and Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration.

Convener: Professor Claire Finkelstein

Moderator: Professor Michael Gross

This session will explore foundational and conceptual questions about the nature of super soldiers, what counts as a “super soldier,” whether super soldiers already exist, and pivotal ethical questions about the existence of super soldiers. Does the common conception of “super soldier” require a distinction between medical interventions and non-medical enhancement interventions? Can human enhancements be environmental as opposed to organism-specific? Do super soldiers possess a special kind of moral status, such as weaker rights to protective intervention, given their mitigated vulnerability? Are disabled soldiers still “super soldiers” if their capacities count as enhanced relative to their previous, disabled states, but not enhanced relative to a typical, non-disabled human state?

Convener: Dr. Blake Hereth

Moderator: Professor Victoria Sutton

This session will consider how super soldiers are understood within and across cultures, why some cultures encourage while others discourage the creation of super soldiers, and how super soldiers fit within different societies. What is the purpose of super soldiers in different cultures, and how are super soldiers viewed as integrating (or not integrating) within specific societies? Does the loss of typical human functioning, or the presence of enhanced human functioning, violate cultural norms of the human body as a sacred space, a context of choice, etc.? How might culturally influential religions view and respond to enhanced warfighters, particularly ones whose cognitions are effectively blended with AI?

Convener: Dr. Nicholas Evans

Moderator: Dr. Łukasz Kamieński

This session will review current and near-future enhancement technologies; evaluate their potential uses, risks, and benefits; and discuss current, civilian enhancement research. These technologies range from brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) to futuristic brain chips that integrate AI into human cognition to pharmacological interventions that dull physical pain or block traumatic memories. What enhancement technologies are feasible, and which are merely fanciful? Are there important limitations to human enhancement that are unlikely to be overcome? Should enhancement technologies be developed only by the state, or also by private contractors and companies? How can the U.S. military anticipate and prepare for the development and implementation of enhancement technologies by unfriendly states or, perhaps worse, non-state actors?

Convener: Dr. Ilya Rudyak

Moderator: Dr. William Casebeer

This session will confront ethical questions about the research and development of super soldiers, including questions about consent and coercion, inegalitarian worries about social stratification of humans vs. super-humans, and immoral risks. Is informed consent possible or especially difficult to acquire for enhancements that significantly transform human subjects? Should researchers be concerned about a kneejerk tendency among warfighters to accept uncritically enhancements that will better protect themselves or members of their unit, squad, etc.? Given extensive racial biases in research subject selection and military recruitment, should additional barriers exist to prevent disproportionately non-white recruitment?

Convener: Mr. David Joanson

Moderator: Dr. Duncan MacIntosh

This session will focus on ethical concerns surrounding the use of super soldiers in policing, war, and civil unrest. If super soldiers are capable of inflicting extreme harm on third parties, does this expand their potential liability or the potential liability of those who deploy or design them? Is it ever permissible to utilize super soldiers for domestic policing? What safeguards should be created to ensure super soldiers never become rogue actors, and how might these safeguards be permissibly designed and enforced? Might it be permissible to execute enemy prisoners of war if, as super soldiers, they pose extreme dangers of violent escape?

Convener: Major Kyle Brown

Moderator: Dr. Paul Tubig

This session will probe the ethics of dis-enhancing super soldiers into “mere” soldiers or civilians. The removal of enhanced senses, intelligence, physical prowess, and pain insensitivity are ethically fraught. Should we view warfighter enhancements as the property of warfighters? For enhanced capacities removed from warfighters post bellum, if the loss of those capacities adversely impacts dis-enhanced warfighters, can they qualify for disability status and benefits? Does the state, perhaps through the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, possess an obligation to reinstitute these enhancements for therapeutic or autonomy-based reasons?

Convener: Brig. Gen. (Ret.) Stephen N. Xenakis, MD

Moderator: Dr. Adam Henschke

This session will outline our ethical obligations to veteran super soldiers, including society’s obligation to be prepared to care for super soldiers prior to creating them. While the same obligation holds for super soldiers, the complex and untested nature of many enhancements complicates our ability to anticipate their long-term effects and, thus, the long-term care of super soldiers. Is the state obligated to help retired super soldiers cloak their special abilities to enable social reintegration? If super soldiers employ their special abilities in other lines of work, is the military liable for enhancements that malfunction outside their intended sphere of use? What is the statute of limitations on this liability? When super soldiers die, should the state have dominating/veto power over how their bodies—in particular, parts of their bodies containing classified military technology—are disposed of?