Could be AI, human pilots, or a combination of both, the basic math doesn’t change. (Even if every drone needs a human pilot, it would totally be feasible to concentrate hundreds or thousands of fiber optic drones on a position.)
The time when drones don’t need human operators for most of the time in combat may be sooner than you think. Consider how Waymos operate autonomously but can call in a human operator to take over if they get stuck. I imagine something similar could happen for drones, where e.g. a group of N drones fly in a flock/swarm from point A to point B fully autonomously, and when they are approaching the target a human operator looking through their cameras paints the targets (yes, that’s a soldier, yes, that’s a tank, yes, you are clear to engage) and the AI does the rest.
IIRC even more autonomy than that is already being trialed, I think I heard about a prototype that goes into some sort of ‘autonomous seek and destroy mode’ where it just roams around completely disconnected from its human operators and attacks any targets it recognizes.
I agree that lots of other things about war will change due to AI, but the importance of drones, I think, is not going to go down thanks to AI.
the importance of drones, I think, is not going to go down thanks to AI.
I agree. What I tried to say though was that my guess is that for drones to stay as effective as they currently are for 5 years would require AI capable enough that it would transform so many aspects of society that for us in 2025 to try to project out that far becomes futile.
Could be AI, human pilots, or a combination of both, the basic math doesn’t change. (Even if every drone needs a human pilot, it would totally be feasible to concentrate hundreds or thousands of fiber optic drones on a position.)
The time when drones don’t need human operators for most of the time in combat may be sooner than you think. Consider how Waymos operate autonomously but can call in a human operator to take over if they get stuck. I imagine something similar could happen for drones, where e.g. a group of N drones fly in a flock/swarm from point A to point B fully autonomously, and when they are approaching the target a human operator looking through their cameras paints the targets (yes, that’s a soldier, yes, that’s a tank, yes, you are clear to engage) and the AI does the rest.
IIRC even more autonomy than that is already being trialed, I think I heard about a prototype that goes into some sort of ‘autonomous seek and destroy mode’ where it just roams around completely disconnected from its human operators and attacks any targets it recognizes.
I agree that lots of other things about war will change due to AI, but the importance of drones, I think, is not going to go down thanks to AI.
I agree. What I tried to say though was that my guess is that for drones to stay as effective as they currently are for 5 years would require AI capable enough that it would transform so many aspects of society that for us in 2025 to try to project out that far becomes futile.