AI, Autonomy, and the Future of Warfare

Catalog description

The future of war is not in winning a race for technology but in maximizing technological adaptability. How well, and how fast, nations can identify, build, field, and integrate new technology into their national defense will be far more important than being a leader in any particular tech. In this contest, national defense has three main players: government, industry, and academia. Together they provide the framework nations use to defend themselves. This class will review how wars are fought and then dive into how government, industry, and academia collaborate, conflict, and construct the systems for the defense of nations. The class will consider technologies like artificial intelligence, autonomous weapons, remotely piloted drones, directed energy weapons, and low earth orbit satellite constellations, evaluating the opportunities and risks for national security and human society. This course will prepare future government, industry, and academic leaders for the complex systems necessary for the developmental, legal, ethical, and operational considerations of hyper-scaling warfare with ever more ubiquitous and destructive technology. The class is in a lecture/discussion format with guest lecturers who are actively working in these spaces. This class is fast paced and immediately relevant, but no experience in the content is necessary, just come to learn and participate.