? Response to Questionnaire ?

In your opinion, how do advancements in AI Pilots have the potential to transform future aerial operations and impact Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)?

AI, Quantum Computing, and Miniaturisation are technologies with maximum impact on air warfare. The combination of these increases the computing power of the aerial systems while reducing their weight and size.

AI-powered UAVs are the future of the air warfare.

The combination of unmanned aerial platforms and long-range vectors is changing warfare into “No Contact Warfare”.

Future air warfare will see the next generation of aerial platforms wherein a combination of manned and unmanned platforms will work as a team. The concept is being called the “Loyal Wing Man Concept” (I call it the “Mother Goose Concept”). Work is going on toward it worldwide including India.

The second future trend is Swarm Technology, wherein, several small (Some as small as insects) drones would work in unison towards a defined task.

Anti-drone systems will also develop. These systems will contain multi-sensors and an assortment of weapons for hard or soft kill. They will be AI-powered to process the large amounts of information being generated.

Regarding the critical aspect of securing Air Superiority, particularly in the context of the Sino-Indian Arena and the Indo-Pak scenario, do you believe the Indian Air Force (IAF) is adequately prepared for the challenges of the future? What, in your view, are the essential requirements for the IAF to meet these challenges effectively?

IAF always works on plans. The first one is to fight with whatever it has and the second is for capability development for future challenges.

Over the last nine decades (especially in the last four decades) air warfare capabilities (like strategic airlift, precision, Standoff, all-weather round-the-clock operation, high altitude ops, etc.) of the IAF have improved significantly.

At present IAF still can make the difference and provide the asymmetry while dealing with current challenges. However, its war-fighting endurance (numerical strength of fighter and combat support aircraft) needs to be boosted.

Capability and capacity development is a continuous process. The future trajectory should cater to future challenges. Some of the essential requirements to deal with future challenges would require:-

- - Enhancement of War Endurance.

- - Infusion of Technology (Quantum, AI, Hypersonic, Stealth, etc.)

- - Reorientation & reorganisation to deal with Grey Zone operations and warfare in domains of warfare like Cyber, Space, Information, and Electronics.

- - Integration with surface forces and government agencies for the whole of government response.

- - Self-reliant defence industry.

Recognizing the strategic significance of Space in Future Air Warfare, how imperative do you believe it is for India to make the necessary considerations and investments in this domain?

Space has permeated into every aspect of life (communications, surveys, education, banking, traffic management, health care disaster management, etc.).

It has also become an essential domain in warfare (for communications, surveillance, navigation targeting, etc.).

The long-range vectors Including Hypersonic) and new-generation platforms are using the medium of space.

In such a scenario of high dependence on space-based systems, space warfare (i.e. denial of space operations to the enemy and freedom of own forces to use the medium of space) both offensive and defensive becomes very important.

India’s space program is progressing well, however, the space-based technologies and systems are developed first for civilian use and then for the military. This work needs to go on in parallel.

Private participation besides public R&D and industry is essential.

An appropriate organisation needs to be set up to harness space and deal with space warfare. Advanced Air Forces like The USAF have a space command. China has gone a step further by making a separate service (Joint Strategic Support Force) to deal with all four domains (Cyber, Space, Information, and Electronic).

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Information and data included in the blog are for educational & non-commercial purposes only and have been carefully adapted, excerpted, or edited from sources deemed reliable and accurate. All copyrighted material belongs to respective owners and is provided only for purposes of wider dissemination.

AI is going to change the world more than anything in the history of mankind.

– Kai-Fu Lee

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has permeated into all aspects of our lives. AI tools are everywhere we look. AI is delivering tangible benefits across every industry one can think about.

Transportation: Although it could take a decade or more to perfect them, autonomous cars will one day ferry us from place to place.

Manufacturing: AI powered robots work alongside humans to perform a limited range of tasks like assembly and stacking, and predictive analysis sensors keep equipment running smoothly.

Healthcare: In the comparatively AI-nascent field of healthcare, diseases are more quickly and accurately diagnosed, drug discovery is sped up and streamlined, virtual nursing assistants monitor patients and big data analysis helps to create a more personalized patient experience.

Education: Textbooks are digitized with the help of AI, early-stage virtual tutors assist human instructors and facial analysis gauges the emotions of students to help determine who’s struggling or bored and better tailor the experience to their individual needs.

Media: Journalism is harnessing AI, too, and will continue to benefit from it. Bloomberg uses Cyborg technology to help make quick sense of complex financial reports. The Associated Press employs the natural language abilities of Automated Insights to produce 3,700 earning reports stories per year — nearly four times more than in the recent past.

Customer Service: Last but hardly least, Google is working on an AI assistant that can place human-like calls to make appointments at, say, your neighbourhood hair salon. In addition to words, the system understands context and nuance.

Future Trajectory

Most AI applications today are classified as “narrow” or “weak” AI, meaning that they usually carry out a specific task they are designed for.

AI is only just getting started. Computers will get smarter, quicker, and increasingly become capable of tasks that traditionally are carried out by humans, such as making complex decisions or engaging in creative thought. Truly intelligent entities would not be designed for one specific task but would be able to carry out many number of tasks.

A Quantum Powered AI

Computing power is the engine of AI.

Quantum computing, along with other next-level processing capabilities such as biological and neuromorphic computing, is likely to unlock even more possibilities.

Quantum computing is basically, ability of sub-atomic particles to exist in more than one state at the same time. It is theoretically capable of completing some calculations up to 100 trillion times faster than today’s fastest computers.

In order to continually evolve to become smarter, machine learning models will inevitably become larger.

Additionally, more processing power means we will be able to create larger amounts of “synthetic” data for training purposes, reducing the need for collecting real data to feed into algorithms for many applications.

Other technologies like neuromorphic computing would be able to mimic the “elastic” capabilities of the human brain to adapt themselves to processing new forms of information.

Creative AI

These days we can see art, music, poetry, and even computer code is being created by AI.

This has been made possible by the ongoing development of “generative” AI i.e. when Ai creates new data rather than simply analyzing and understanding existing data.

With generative AI, analyzing and understanding is the first step of the process. It then takes what it has learned and uses it to build further examples of the models that it has studied.

This ability to create synthetic data will lead us into an era where machines will be doing things we simply haven’t seen them do before.

Ethical and Accountable AI

At the moment, much of the inner workings of today’s AI is not transparent due to proprietary algorithms or complexity involved.

This creates a trust deficit and reluctance to let machines make decisions that affect people’s lives.

If AI is going to live up to its potential, then the smart machines of the near future will have to be more transparent, explainable, and accountable than the ones we’re familiar with now.

Legislative and regulatory changes are likely to be put in place in future.

Interesting

Intel recently unveiled its Loihi processing chip, packed with more than two billion transistors, which is one application that was able to identify ten different types of hazardous material by smell alone – more quickly and accurately than trained sniffer dogs.

Titbits

Adversial Model – AI vs AI

The most impressive results available today are usually obtained when this is done via an “adversarial” model – effectively, two AIs are pitted against each other, with one tasked with creating something based on existing data and the other tasked with finding flaws in the new creation. When these flaws are discovered, the creative network (known as the “generator”) learns from its mistakes and eventually becomes capable of creating data that its opponent (the “discriminator” network) finds increasingly hard to distinguish from the existing data.

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