Forget Terminators, says US military, the next-gen AI battles will hinge upon net infrastructure, not killer robots
- Reference: 1599765104
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/09/10/us_dod_ai/
- Source link:
Colonel Brad Boyd, the chief of Joint Warfighting Operations at the Department of Defense’s Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC), said the most important work is “all the unsexy stuff.” The ability to collect data, curate it, and move it seamlessly across software pipelines to train new systems or improve old models is more critical than developing the best autonomous weapon.
“What we’re working the hardest on is infrastructure, that is where the fight of 20 years will be won,” he said during a press briefing on Thursday. "It’s not who has the most exquisite algorithm – that will be obsolete in 20 years – it will be who has the best infrastructure that will still be around in 50 years."
The JAIC last month awarded a contract worth up to $106m over four years to Deloitte Consulting to build a custom cloud platform named the Joint Common Foundation ( [1]JCF ) for the Pentagon. The management consultancy firm won’t be developing the software itself, in true military contractor style.
Instead, it’s in charge of sub-contracting cloud providers that will do all the nitty-gritty work. Said outfits have yet to be decided, it appears.
Be very afraid! British Army might scrap battle tanks for keyboard warriors – report [2]READ MORE
The JCF will act as a centralised hub to store labelled datasets, and contain various tools to help vendors build and evaluate products for the military. ‘It will help push and democratise AI across the department,” said Nand Mulchandani, JAIC’s Acting Director.
The enterprise-oriented platform will be designed to integrate with other environments too, including the Pentagon’s $10bn enormo-enterprise-cloud project dubbed JEDI, which is set to [3]be built by Microsoft if the legal wrangling is ever straightened out.
Pulling all the datasets into one easy-to-use repository allows developers to experiment with new algorithms and evaluate them with little fuss. “AI has an insatiable appetite for data. There is no point at which your AI algorithm is done; it is constantly getting updated and tested,” Mulchandani added.
Deployment is tricky too, and performance of the machine-learning software may well depend on where on Earth it’s being used in. “You can’t deploy one algorithm in one part of the world, and expect it to work on another part,” Mulchandani added. It requires feeding models on custom data to adapt it for a specific region or application. Mulchandani called the process a “retraining cycle," commenting: “It’s something that we have to get really good at.”
“The JCF is currently operating off the Platform One cloud, but will be JEDI ready when the enterprise cloud comes online,” the JAIC’s spokesman told us. The Air Force’s [4]Platform One is an ecosystem of software and IT services, including [5]RepoOne , which is made up of a network of “hardened and evaluated containers” and code to harden Kubernetes. ®
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[1] https://www.ai.mil/blog_03_25_20-developing_the_jcf_dhodges.html
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2020/08/25/british_army_scrap_tanks_cyber/
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2020/09/02/oracle_jedi_appeal/
[4] https://software.af.mil/team/platformone/
[5] https://software.af.mil/dsop/services/
[6] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
I'm of the opinion that next next serious wars will be fought via the personal touch; poison, gas, knife play, assassination. Too much to lose in commerce and infrastructure to risk turning the military-industrial complex on civilization.
Try sticks and sharpened rocks.
No, that's WW IV. After the nukes get loose in WW III.
I think they should try their hands at satire and sarcasm and maybe a touch of irony. The Irish Celts could make and break kings with a satirical pamphlet and some believed a master satirist could kill with words.
If the pentagon can master those, they will be able to rule the world, fortunately, it is unlikely to be soon.
Why wage war ?
There is at the moment only 2 large powers - the USA and China. If you look at the US Debt Clock (https://www.usdebtclock.org/ ) especially the amount of unfunded liabilities (over $154 trillion and currently rising at over $15 million per minute!!), it is difficult to see the US staying as a major power. Sooner or later the US will go the same way as the USSR - economic collapse. If the human race is very lucky then the US President when that happens will not be as stupid as the current one and will not launch nukes.
When the US collapses, it will take down the world financial structure - only China has a chance of weathering the storm.
China at the moment is propping up the US by accepting Treasury Bills that they know may become worthless, the reason - China wants to be self sufficient before the collapse occurs.
Icon for what could happen ==========================>
Short-term thinking
> “What we’re working the hardest on is infrastructure, that is where the fight of 20 years will be won... It’s not who has the most exquisite algorithm – that will be obsolete in 20 years – it will be who has the best infrastructure that will still be around in 50 years."
The way things are going there might not be any infrastructure in 50 years. It's funny that when it comes to macho stuff like weaponry, governments are only too keen to think long term, when the real need for future planning is to reverse environmental destruction/climate change/massive concentration of wealth at the top (they are all linked).
> 'the Pentagon’s $10bn enormo-enterprise-cloud project dubbed JEDI'. WTF? They're actually serious. SHB Joint Operational Knucklehead Enterprise. 'JEDI'. LOL