What DARPA's Been Up To, At Length 54
The New York Times takes an inside look at DARPA, the secretive defense agency, mentioned frequently on Slashdot, that is "changing the way we use machines — and the way they use us" in the form of a review of Michael Belfiore's The Department of Mad Scientists. Besides tracing the history of the agency, Belfiore's book expounds on the well-known Grand Challenge and its link to ever-more-automated vehicle control in civilian and military contexts, as well as other DARPA pet projects, including robotic surgery, information analysis, and the integration of electronics with the human body.
Re:The truth (Score:5, Insightful)
Science isn't about doing something and getting the expected results. Science is about doing something and when reviewing the results going 'Well that's odd. Guys come here and look at this.' And then discovering something new.
Science and ethics (Score:1, Insightful)
The interesting bit in the article is about modern-day Cybrogs and how we and machines are getting integrated. Of course the article is designed to startle - after all people will read it only if it challenges them. But should we really be scared?
It is not really any more alarming then "machines that can actually create cloth" were in the early 19th century. That too was a ceding of a human ability to machine enhancement.
We need to realize that we always were part machine - albeit chemical and biological ones, rather than electrical and metal ones.
So what makes us human? Certainly not emotion, that is easy to simulate. Perhaps it is free will, social intelligence and an inquisitive inventive mind ? Perhaps it is the combination of all this in a single package: we are multi-purpose, FLEXIBLE, animals.
And what if a machine can be built that would do all that, and would be just as multi-purpose? Intellectually that would simply prove our own nature: multi-purpose flexible machines is what we are. Politically it would be something we can legislate against if we dislike it: after all we already have humans; why build a "mark II" if we like "mark I" ?
Our humanity is in danger from only one thing: laziness. If, due to our own laziness we give away our free will, social intelligence and inquisitive inventive mind - then we are in trouble.
That would happen if we allow educational standards to keep slipping. It certainly could happen, but its up to us.
Re:The truth (Score:2, Insightful)
Science isn't about doing something and getting the expected results. Science is about doing something and when reviewing the results going 'Well that's odd. Guys come here and look at this.' And then discovering something new.
DARPA is military research, whose point is about doing something and getting the expected results.
If you want science, go get funding from the National Science Foundation.
Re:The truth (Score:3, Insightful)
The only firm "deliverables" (CDRLs in contract-speak) in most DARPA contracts are status reports and a final writeup. If you get something that actually works it's a major bonus for future contract work, of course, but doesn't affect your DARPA money. That's why it's called "Research" and not "Development". Sometimes trying for something impossible turns up some interesting discoveries. Sometimes not.
Re:The actual truth (Score:1, Insightful)
And then there are the rockstars of DARPA initiatives, like Lincoln Labs, who appear to be interested in marrying scruffy neural networks with the flight control and combat systems on modern war planes. And there are hundreds of things in between, such as the science and methodology of evacuating megalopolises in coastal regions, which while amounting to ultimately nothing more than the biggest makefile in the world, are still mostly very interesting.
DARPA is like any other shadowing government organization which operates outside the law: Some people are working on irrelevant, boring crap. Some people are working on earth shattering mega theories. But most are somewhere in the middle, trying to pay their kid's medical insurance while at the same time trying to do something that interests them. Money get's thrown around DARPA projects based almost completely on who's doing the throwing, and it's never the same person. Sure there's an ugly side to DARPA funding... but as you should know perfectly well if you've been the recipient of any sort of funding, public or private, there's *always* an ugly side to it.
Re:The truth (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is really why the NSF should be given a reliably large sum of money each year and told to just make the best use of it.
Re:The truth (Score:5, Insightful)
You're missing the point. DARPA is about reaching a long-term goal -- one which isn't achievable with existing science/engineering. DARPA contracts are short term contracts whose goal is to determine why one small step towards the ultimate goal is not achievable. This is followed by another contract that determines how to facilitate the previous step ... or to determine how that is blocked. And it keeps on going!
Eventually there is success, and the success flows back to the first step ... except now you are asked to go just a bit farther to discover what the next block is.
The PM's job is to keep an eye on the overall goal & to act as a champion for the program. And, although they are generally experienced technical managers, PM's don't remain at DARPA for a long time, it's just too intense.
If you understand what is going on, and DARPA contracts are great to work on, encouraging freedom & creativity, and you'll probably get more contracts. If not then you'll end up frustrated, somebody else will have to dig through your CDRLs to get the needed data, and the followup contract will end up going to somebody who understands the process.