[sneak]

Not everyone agrees that a soldier killing a soldier during a conflict is objectively not murder.

Many of us, including many intelligent people, think that all such premeditated killing is objectively murder regardless of the political context.

Please don't handwave this fact away.

[cloverich]

Given that some people do not see a soldier killing another solider vs a serial killer killing a random person as different, I think it is relevant. The technical distinction as far as I can tell is homicide (killing in any sense) vs murder (unlawful killing, e.g. not what soldiers typically do). How can one have a discussion about the ethics if those are not different? To flip it around, how could we have a discussion about the ethics of software and human life, if one of us believed that a serial killer killing people was an ok thing to do? e.g. everything would be ok, so there's no discussion? Conversely if all forms of combat killing are not ok, then there's no discussion to be had.