SCI-FI LEADS THE WAY As a rare combination of novelist, nonfic- tion writer and scholar, Singer sees elements of science fiction today predict- ing what technologies the military will spin in from the civilian world tomorrow.
“Artificial intelligence, of course, and autonomous robotics are some of the most frequent technologies that pop up in sci-fi, and they are definitively part of military futures,” he said. “Brain-machine interface technology, you know, is already being played with in labs and in video gaming. I see that moving over to the mili- tary in the future.”
Three-D printing is “really the ‘Star Trek’ replicator in a certain way, already popping up on military bases in a mostly ad hoc manner.”
Singer also predicts that the U.S. military is also going to see more biological tech- nology. “Tere are amazing breakthroughs happening in the biosciences and genom- ics affecting, of course, not just diseases,
FUTURE MATERIALS
Army scientists explore materials at the nano level with the goal of finding stronger or more heat-resistant compounds that could be used to design more durable, secure computers. (U.S. Army photo by David McNally, U.S. Army Research Laboratory)
Is the U.S. military in a position to seize
advantages that are already there,
such as the internet?
but shaping what humans can do that they couldn’t do previously. And if it’s being used in health, if it’s being used in sports, we shouldn’t be surprised to see it make its way over to the world of war, too.”
Tis crossover from fiction to fact is noth- ing new, he said. “Science fiction has always played with technologies that then become real and then are applied to war, whether it was the flying machine or the undersea boat or H.G. Wells’ concept of an ‘atomic bomb.’ It’s going to be the same thing in the 21st century. Of that, I’m confident.”
MARGARET C. ROTH is an editor of Army AL&T magazine. She has more than a decade of experience in writing about the Army and more than three decades’ experience in journalism and public rela- tions. Roth is a MG Keith L. Ware Public Affairs Award winner and a co-author of the book “Operation Just Cause: Te Storming of Panama.” She holds a B.A. in Russian language and linguistics from the Univer- sity of Virginia.
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CRITICAL THINKING
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