New Technologies and the Future of War and Peace
Oxford University
July 3-5, 2026
Context
This workshop, the first of four, coincides with a new Elements series from Cambridge University Press, The Philosophy of War and Peace, edited by Lee-Ann Chae and Graham Parsons. While inclusive of traditional approaches to the ethics of war, this Elements series also investigates broader questions such as the intersection of culture and war, the historical emergence of just war theory as opposed to pacifism or realism, the full impact of war and the military on real communities, and the strategic limitations of war as a tool of statecraft. This series looks at the problems of war and peace in their full complexity, taking advantage of tools from disciplines across the humanities.
Confirmed Elements authors for the July 2026 workshop include:
- Daniel Brunstetter (Professor of Political Science, UC Irvine) on Force Short of War
- David Danks (Polk JSF Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy, Artificial Intelligence, & Data Science, University of Virginia) on AI and Autonomous Weapons
- Scott Sagan (Professor of Political Science, Stanford University) on Nuclear Just War Doctrine
- Blake Hereth (Assistant Professor of Medical Ethics, Humanities, and Law, University of Western Michigan) on Super Soldiers
Thematic Description
Our collective imaginings about a technologically advanced future are crowded with both doomsday predictions and utopian visions. As the influence of AI becomes ever more marked across myriad and disparate fields – such as communications, medicine, surveillance, education, robotics, and weapons manufacturing – we continue to lurch towards an uncertain future. The rapid development of new technologies is profoundly changing the nature of war and the possibilities of peace, with significant implications for how we understand and enforce human rights. This conference will explore how new technologies are impacting traditional human rights (including privacy, free speech and free association, and freedom of movement) and the laws of war, and will also consider how our reliance on technology is changing our conception of a flourishing human life.
Participants
Daniel Brunstetter (Professor of Political Science, University of California, Irvine)
Ethics, Escalation, and Force Short of War
Jus ad vim is the set of moral principles governing the decision to use limited force. Essential to this novel addition to just war theory is a presumption against escalation from limited force to war. In most cases, the justice of limited force hinges on using force to act on a just cause in such a way that does not lead one’s adversary to up the ante and escalate hostilities. The probability of escalation principle, introduced as part of the set of jus ad vim principles, helps to gauge the likelihood of this happening. This paper explores different varieties of escalation, associated moral dilemmas, and moral guidelines. Building on the five types of escalation identified in the literature (retaliatory, initiator, regional, prospective, and on-the-ground escalation), the paper identifies important variations of escalation, what I term provocative, micro, geographical, quantitative, threat-infused [escalate to de-escalate], environmental, and nuclear escalation. The cycles of limited force exchanges between India and Pakistan and the escalatory violence between 2024-2026 that engulfed the Middle East will illustrate the main arguments. Finally, the international community’s response to these scenarios places the moral duty to de-escalate at the center of strategic posturing and diplomatic maneuvering.
David Danks (Polk JSF Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy, Artificial Intelligence, & Data Science, University of Virginia)
AI and Autonomous Weapons
AI is rapidly reshaping almost all aspects of modern warfare and conflict, most notably through increasing use of AI-enabled autonomy in weapons systems. AI and autonomous weapons potentially change conflicts in ways that raise important ethical, psychological, and political challenges. This talk will explore philosophical questions around three types of uses for AI: Finding, Acting, and Understanding. Throughout, the emphasis will be on the double-edged nature of AI and autonomous weapons, as their impacts often depend more on the choices that people make, rather than the technology itself.
Andrew Fiala (Professor of Philosophy, California State University, Fresno)
“Developing Nonviolent Artificial Intelligence: System Prompts and Speculative Hope”
The “system prompts” of artificial intelligence must include “nonviolent system prompts.” This is linked to Asimov’s first law of robotics, which is a general principle of nonmaleficence that creates safety and “refusal” constraints. This should be developed and deepened by a concern to minimize or avoid violence. If appropriately deployed, ethical AI with nonviolent system prompts could transform the world in a more peaceful direction. The utopian imagination extends to a world in which police and military leaders would engage in dialogue with AI systems that insist on a nonviolence-first approach to the use of force. These systems would remind human decision-makers of the need to minimize violence. They may propose non-violent alternatives to the use of force. And they may even challenge human decision-makers to justify themselves in light of the nonviolent system prompts programmed into the AI. It is even possible to imagine autonomous or agential AI systems refusing unethical (i.e., violent) instructions. There are obvious dangers. Not only should we fear malicious automated systems running amok (the dystopian nightmare of unethical and violent AI); but we may also need to reckon with the destabilizing impact of nonviolent “ethical AI” that challenges military and police violence.
Brian Hutler (Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Temple University)
“Drones, Data, and Dignity”
Jurgita Imbrasaite (Senior Research Fellow, Center for Science and Thought, Bonn University)
“Plurality Under Algorithmic Conditions: Arendt, AI, and the Political Meaning of Peace”
Nicolás Paz (Director, Catholic Nonviolence Initiative)
“Toward Nonviolent Epistemological and Material Responses to Contemporary Technologies of War and Repression”
Lonneke Peperkamp (Professor of Military Ethics and Leadership, Netherlands Defence Academy)
“Jus ad Vim Spatialis: A Normative Assessment of Force, Limited Force, and Other Hostile Acts in Space”
Mitt Regan (Professor of Jurisprudence, Georgetown Law) and Kevin Mullaney (Permanent Military Professor of Leadership Education and Development, U.S. Naval Academy)
“Embodiment, Context, and Moral Agency in AI Weapon Systems”
Cheyney Ryan (Senior Research Fellow, ELAC, Oxford)
TBA
Regina Surber (Postdoc in Philosophy, University of Zurich)
“Do Soldiers Kill Intentionally?”
The presentation offers an action-philosophical analysis of belligerent killing based on the classical approach to human agency that understands intentional action as action for reasons and action that is in some relevant sense under its agent’s control. The presentation, first, demonstrates how soldiers are militarily routinized to kill and mentally conditioned to rationalize it. I will also describe moral injury, a debilitating time-lagged value conflict prevalent among veterans. I then explain the classical approach to intentional action as the reference point for qualifying belligerent killing as habitual action. I will also attempt to argue for an integrated theory of the sensitivity of the human body, because the limits of the human ability for intentional action arguably lie at the limits of control in action that depends on physical awareness and the body’s responsiveness to rational considerations. This is why numbing the body, exemplified by military training, could compromise the condition for expressing reason in action. The subsequent action-theoretical analysis of belligerent killing implies that morally injured soldiers appear not to kill intentionally due to training, meaning for reasons constitutive of their very ability to kill. Further, the disvalue in compromising the condition for expressing reason in action by numbing the body could ground a pro tanto reason against training professional soldiers which may have to be put in the balance of reasons in favor and against militarization.
Zeke Vergara (Graduate Student in Philosophy, University of Pennsylvania)
“AI and Mercenaries”
States are increasingly using commercially developed AI in various military capacities, and some states are militarily deploying AI technology that is developed in other states. In this paper, I argue that the AI that states deploy militarily (a) ought to be publicly developed and that it (b) ought to be developed in the state that deploys it. I defend these two claims by considering the philosophical literature on mercenaries. While some philosophers defend the use of mercenaries, the philosophical literature on mercenaries broadly objects to them. On the one hand, philosophers contend that public forces should fight our wars, not private military and security companies. On the other hand, philosophers maintain that our forces should fight our wars, not other forces. By offering suitably revised versions of these anti-mercenary objections, I hold that we should prefer that the AI that we deploy militarily is ours and is publicly developed.
Sponsors
This conference is hosted and generously sponsored by the Oxford Consortium for Human Rights.
Conference Organizers
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Temple University
Visiting Professor of Philosophy
Vassar College
Senior Research Fellow
Institute for Ethics, Law, and Armed Conflict
Blavatnik School of Government, Oxford University