UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, IRVINE War by Algorithm: Giambattista Vico and Ethics of War in the Techno-Logical Era DISSERTATION submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in Political Science by John Robert Emery Dissertation Committee: Associate Professor Daniel R. Brunstetter, Chair Professor Cecelia M. Lynch Professor Brent J. Steele 2019 © 2019 John Robert Emery Table of Contents Page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iv CURRICULUM VITAE v ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION vi INTRODUCTION 1 Questions of Modernity and Its Legacy in Contemporary Techno-Warfare 12 Ethics of War and Artificial Intelligence 16 Connecting Technologies of War and Ethics 22 CHAPTER 1: Giambattista Vico: Law, Language, and Eloquence in Interpretivist 29 International Relations Vichian Humanism 37 Natural Law 41 Against Descartes and Abstract Rationalism 49 Language and Social Construction 55 Science of Imagination in an Intersubjective World 63 Conclusion: Vico’s Impact on Ethics of War Today 70 CHAPTER 2: AI and the Poetic Wisdom of Giambattista Vico: Ethics of War in The 78 Technological Era Ethics Of War Today 81 Giambattista Vico and Just War 93 Poetic Wisdom 99 Artificial Intelligence and Just War Tomorrow 107 CHAPTER 3: The Cold War Game: Quest for Certainty in the Nuclear Era 111 The Cold War Game 115 Futurecasting: Social Sciences Vs. Mathematics 135 Technostrategic Discourse and The Ethics of War 150 Human-Machine Integration and the Rise of Precision-Guided Munitions 166 Conclusion 168 CHAPTER 4: Probabilities Toward Death: Algorithmic Warfare, Machine-Learning 171 Assassinations, and Techno-Ethics. ii Techno-Ethics: From Practical Judgment to Computation in Western Warfare 177 Machine-Learning Assassination and the Erosion of the Subject 188 Artificial Intelligence: The False Promises of Perfect Rationality 193 Conclusion 201 CHAPTER 5: Conclusion 208 iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to express the deepest appreciation to my committee chair, Daniel R. Brunstetter. His friendship, guidance, and mentorship throughout my PhD program was instrumental to me becoming the scholar that I am. He helped me carve out a space for my own voice in political science, balancing my countless interests from political theory, to technology, and grappling with the dilemmas of war in new and interesting ways. Without his pragmatic mentality that never sacrificed genuine novel scholarship, I would not have been able to complete these six grueling years; I am forever grateful to Daniel. It was his faith in me and my work that led to our first of many co-authored publications, as well as opening doors to build a supportive network of scholars from our first conference together. In the end, this dissertation could not have been completed without Daniel’s unending comments on drafts and assistance in framing my work within an established literature while still paving my own path. He is truly someone I am proud to have worked with and to forever call a friend. I would also like to thank Brent Steele for his friendship and assistance navigating the world of ethics, conflict, and International Relations. He has been an influential figure in my scholarship from our first meeting at UCI through many beer meetings at every conference around the globe. Brent has showed me a way to enjoy every minute of what I do and not get bogged down in researching too narrow a topic just to fill a gap in the literature that doesn’t need to be filled. I would also like to extend my thanks to Cecelia Lynch for aiding me in interrogating my methodological, epistemological, and philosophical assumptions. My first course with her at UCI was mostly spent looking up words like epistemology and ontology, but her interpretive methods course truly helped me articulate and find a space for the work I had been doing all along. Without her broad and exciting course readings, I may have relegated myself to compromising my scholarly values in the name of expediency. Cecelia has influenced my work more than she may realize and this dissertation is a result of that philosophical and methodological influence. I would also like to extend a special thanks to Bill Mauer and Mona Lynch for a fantastic year of debate, discussion, and workshopping for the NSF-funded Technology, Law, and Society working group and a successful summer institute. Without this interdisciplinary environment, my work on technology in warfare would not be what it is today. To all of my friends and colleagues in graduate school at UCI and beyond, I am forever indebted to your friendship and support through what was a trying six years. You were always there to celebrate my successes and commiserate in our failings. Graduate school is not possible without love and commiseration from those that are all struggling through a PhD program. To my wife Lilianna, you have seen my highs and lows of this dissertation with your unending compassion and support in a tenuous job market, I am lucky to call myself your partner, I love you. Finally, I would like to thank my mother and father, Jo Ann and Bob Emery, who have always prioritized and sacrificed for my education, I know how proud you are of me and I could never have imagined achieving a PhD without your love and constant encouragement. Thank you, this achievement is our cumulative success. iv CURRICULUM VITAE John Robert Emery 2012 B.A. in European Studies, Minor Italian Studies, Gonzaga University 2016 M.A. in Political Science, University of California, Irvine 2017-2018 Technology, Law, & Society Fellowship funded by the Early-concept Grants for Exploratory Research (EAGER) of the National Science Foundation, University of California, Irvine 2019 Ph.D. in Political Science, University of California, Irvine FIELD OF STUDY International Relations, Ethics of War and Peace, Critical Security Studies, and Political Theory PUBLICATIONS Emery, John R. (R&R) “Probabilities Toward Death: Algorithmic Warfare, Machine-Learning Assassinations, and Techno-Ethics.” Emery, John R. (2017) “Balancing Security, Risk, and Uncertainty in an Era of Contested and Fragmented Sovereignty.” In Daniel Brunstetter and Jean-Vincent Holeindre (Eds.), The Ethics of War and Peace Revisited: Moral Challenges in an Era of Contested and Fragmented Sovereignty.Washington DC: Georgetown University Press. Emery, John R. (2016) “The Promises and Pitfalls of Humanitarian Drones.” Ethics & International Affairs 30 no. 2: 153-165. DOI: 10.1017/S0892679415000556. Emery, John R. & Brunstetter, D. (2016) “Restricting the Preventive Use of Force: Drones, the Struggle Against Non-State Actors and Jus ad Vim.” In Kerstin Fisk and Jennifer Ramos (Eds.), Preventive Force: Drones Targeted Killing and the Transformation of Contemporary Warfare. New York: New York University Press. Emery, John R. & Brunstetter, D. (2015) “Drones as Aerial Occupation.” Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice 27 no. 4: 424-431. DOI: 10.1080/10402659.2015.1094319. v ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION War by Algorithm: Giambattista Vico and Ethics of War in the Techno-Logical Era By John Robert Emery Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science University of California, Irvine, 2019 Associate Professor Daniel Brunstetter, Chair In an era where humans are increasingly being replaced or augmented by technological innovation, how might the humanist tradition offer us guiding questions for ethics of war today? My talk will explore the U.S. discourse of how improved battlefield technology is believed to make Western war an inherently more ethical space that eases the liberal conscience in killing. Drawing on the logics and practices of U.S. war making, my talk will address three phases of the transition from an ethics of practical judgment and due care to a computational techno-ethics of war. First, it traces the rise of smart bombs alongside collateral damage estimation software. Second, I examine the machine-learning processes that constructs ‘legitimate targets’ in US drone strikes via heterogeneous correlations of SIM card metadata. Third, I survey the consequences of a quantified global battlefield and the improbability of ‘meaningful human control’ over artificially intelligent ‘killer robots’. War by algorithm ultimately removes us from the act of killing while proffering a more ethical ‘science of warfare’. These practices enable decision-makers to tick the ethical box of due care with technology that is believed to be objective and neutral, yet in reality, has simply buried bias deep within the algorithmic code. Not only do these technologies of war and big data shape our caPacity to think ethically, but fundamentally call us to reassess how complex ethico- political dilemmas of war could be replaced by computation. What is at stake is the erosion of effective constraints on the use of lethal force because this techno-rationalization of a quantified risk assessment has supplanted ethical decision-making, the site of the body, and emotions in contemporary conflict. Ultimately, I will argue that the science of humanity of Giambattista Vico, allows us to rethink algorithmic epistemologies of war in novel ways that bring the human back to the forefront of ethical decision-making in the 21st Century. vi Introduction “Today we glory in science and in cybernetic instruments, entrusting our future to them, forgetting that we still have the problem of finding ‘data,’ of ‘inventing them,’ since the cybernetic process can only elaborate them and draw consequences from them. The problem of the essence of the human genius and of its creativity