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 Drones -> are the reliable and safe?
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| bbarr97 |
Posted on 20-01-2006 02:52
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 Posts: 8 Joined: January 18 2006 |
I noticed NGCS fighters will primarily be unmanned drones. Has there been any significant discussion on the reliability and safety of an all drone fighter force? While many benifits can be gained from taking out the human element in fighters others are lost. I have many ways to play devils advocate regarding this situation but was first interested if this is up for discussion/debate? bbarr97 |
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| Inert |
Posted on 20-01-2006 02:55
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 Posts: 388 Joined: September 08 2005 |
Debate.  |
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| Itharu |
Posted on 20-01-2006 04:25
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 Posts: 363 Joined: September 23 2005 |
Well less combat death. People dying in combat is never good because it subtracts from the funtions and abilities of the ship. In space, nothing beats man power. However it can be said that there is a lower requirement for supporting people on the ship and those resouces can be redirected where need elsewhere on the ship, possibly extending it's range and lowering operation costs. But I see a draw back to having droneships. If they are AI controlled, that's fine, hopefully they're independant of a controlling matrix, or in the case of having a battle computer or personelle operated hopefully they operate in distances of less than a lightsecond from the ship (although that in itself is a huge distance). I see replacement and repair of these things too. No way can you make something super durable, they're going to be in combat after all. And can we honestly say that ships are going to be mostly entire factories to constantly keep replacing lost drones? Or house space for a barrage of replacement parts. I think there's going to be lots of pros and cons and factors into this one... -Fear the Might of the Imperial Cortharian Fleet
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| Sun Tzu |
Posted on 20-01-2006 09:21
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 Posts: 528 Joined: September 08 2005 |
At least one drone/fighter type makes suicide runs on capitalships, which is an extremely good reason for them to be unmanned. Also this probably simplifies the conception of vessels that 'fly' at the highest velocities. |
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| bbarr97 |
Posted on 20-01-2006 15:00
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Posts: 8 Joined: January 18 2006 |
Quote Sun Tzu wrote: At least one drone/fighter type makes suicide runs on capitalships, which is an extremely good reason for them to be unmanned. Also this probably simplifies the conception of vessels that 'fly' at the highest velocities. Suicide runs with drones are less costly in regards to human life but still an option you want to avoid. Drones are typically going to be much more expensive to make than a normal fighter due to the AI routines alone unless they are remotely piloted. I personally do not like taking the human element out of the equation (i.e. fighter) because it offers so much to the dynamic of battles. There are some obvious benefits of taking the human out such as: 1. No fragile human to limit maneuverability of fighter 2. No cockpit results in smaller ship size or more room for equipment. 3. No loss of life with drone destroyed 4. Option to load with explosives for use as suicide missile (still a waste of resources since they are designed to be reusable). 5. Smaller ship size results in more space in carrier and don't need pilot crew compartment (unless these drones are piloted remotely) The main problem with drones is security. Whether it is remote controlled drones or AI drones there is some form of communication taking place between the drone and the carrier. This communication would be encrypted but all encryption can be cracked. This could lead into a worst case scenario where the drones quickly become the enemy. We have been using drones safely in the War on Iraq but the enemy has neither the resources or skills to do such a thing. There are other countries that would have these resources. As far as the Vagyr are concerned there is no doubt they would immediately start research in this field to take advantage of this major weakness. The same can be said for the opposing factions in NGCS. bbarr97 |
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| Itharu |
Posted on 20-01-2006 15:37
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Posts: 363 Joined: September 23 2005 |
Quote bbarr97 wrote: The main problem with drones is security. Whether it is remote controlled drones or AI drones there is some form of communication taking place between the drone and the carrier. This communication would be encrypted but all encryption can be cracked. This could lead into a worst case scenario where the drones quickly become the enemy. We have been using drones safely in the War on Iraq but the enemy has neither the resources or skills to do such a thing. There are other countries that would have these resources. As far as the Vagyr are concerned there is no doubt they would immediately start research in this field to take advantage of this major weakness. The same can be said for the opposing factions in NGCS. bbarr97 I'm seeing drone security as a bigger issue only if they have to be remotely controlled. If you were to cut down on all inputs, such as radio communication, then there is less of a chance the enemy could get into it's programming. That in turn means the drone ship and its AI are operating on a standalone basis and other forms of communication would have to be used (like line of sight, laser communication bursts that would only be excepted from friendly ships.) As for how much it costs to replace AI programming, almost nothing. It could be backed up on the ships computers before each mission, or even when all ships have returned, pool all the combat data from them and have the main computer refine the data and it's own combat programs. An example of a AI drone replacement program can be found in Macross Plus. The idea was sound, but there were some circumstances that alters the program. The Ghost in the Shell TV show also adressed the issue of using sentiant tanks for combat and they often pooled their data after missions, eliminating their indivudality and causing them to consider that fact. -Fear the Might of the Imperial Cortharian Fleet
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| Ontaga |
Posted on 20-01-2006 15:39
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Posts: 4 Joined: January 11 2006 |
True that all encryptions can be cracked. But if you run a seperate communitcation rigged to a explosive in the drone then you are set lol. That way if your enemy went to dock the ships you could just explode them when there in there.
Fight till every last ship
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| The Casualty |
Posted on 20-01-2006 19:56
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Posts: 47 Joined: December 29 2005 |
Drones in the service of the US Army, Airforce, and Navy have all been rather successful, though their use as attack platforms is rather new. As many of you know, the Predator drone can carry a hellfire missile, the new Global Hawk is designed to carry a load equivalent to a light strike fighter. However, drones do crash more than human fighters do, the Air Force lost 10 Predators from January to June 2005, compared to 2 F-16 class A incidents (loss of aircrew or damage over $1,000,000 to a/c). Predators are cheaper and smaller, however, so the total cost is probably close to equivalent, except that when one of those Falcons went down, they lost a pilot worth millions more in training and experience. Drones are controlled from the ground, and so far they are the only aircraft in our inventory that can be piloted by enlisted personnel. That tells me they are basic to operate. They do, however, have substantial limitations. For one, if a problem arises in the air, there is no pilot inside to troubleshoot or evaluate it, the plane has no choice but to crash in many cases. Two, of course there is the risk of the aircraft being "hacked" somehow, but nobody has figured out how to do it. The encryption is incredibly complex and is quite classified. Something tells me it would not be easy to do. I'm pretty sure there are redundant systems so that if one signal is lost the plane is still controlled. On the RQ-4 Global Hawk: "Global Hawk, which has a wingspan of 116 feet (35.3 meters) and is 44 feet (13.4 meters) long, can range as far as 12,000 nautical miles, at altitudes up to 65,000 feet (19,812 meters), flying at speeds approaching 340 knots (about 400 mph) for as long as 35 hours. During a typical mission, the aircraft can fly 1,200 miles to an area of interest and remain on station for 24 hours. Its cloud-penetrating, Synthetic Aperture Radar/Ground Moving Target Indicator, electro-optical and infrared sensors can image an area the size of Illinois (40,000 nautical square miles) in just 24 hours. Through satellite and ground systems, the imagery can be relayed in near-real-time to battlefield commanders." Obviously, deployable loiter time is an advantage towards unmanned systems. No human pilot could keep a combat aircraft up for 24 hours without flying in shifts. The Global Hawk is smaller than an F/A-18C and has exponentially longer range on a single tank of JP5. |
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| Inert |
Posted on 20-01-2006 23:22
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Posts: 388 Joined: September 08 2005 |
Hacking into drones and subverting them under your control is not a viable option. One of them being impossible to replicate ingame. Being remotely controlled is also a less favored option when AI control is readily available. The only time when a drone would receive communications is when given orders, and those can be randomly encrypted every week. So hacking into drones and subverting them would not be a good issue to discuss. Some things you might want to discuss are how efficient drones are vs human pilots. AI is more restricted then human creativity, and will you find a loss of efficiency? Or will you simply be able to conquer with massive numbers? |
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| The Casualty |
Posted on 21-01-2006 00:29
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Posts: 47 Joined: December 29 2005 |
I think a human would defeat a combat drone any day of the week in tactics, but in execution the drone may be superior. Drones don't have to worry about g forces and fatigue, and they can multitask within the battlespace better. Especially in the futuristic world of NGCS, where drones have had many years to evolve in complexity, the human factor might well be outmoded. If humans could beat drones on pure creativity and not have to worry about their physical limitations, then drones would be pointless. |
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| bbarr97 |
Posted on 21-01-2006 01:03
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Posts: 8 Joined: January 18 2006 |
Quote Inert wrote: Hacking into drones and subverting them under your control is not a viable option. One of them being impossible to replicate ingame. Being remotely controlled is also a less favored option when AI control is readily available. The only time when a drone would receive communications is when given orders, and those can be randomly encrypted every week. So hacking into drones and subverting them would not be a good issue to discuss. Some things you might want to discuss are how efficient drones are vs human pilots. AI is more restricted then human creativity, and will you find a loss of efficiency? Or will you simply be able to conquer with massive numbers? Good to know that switching control in the hw2 engine is not possible. So subverting control is a mute issue. I have to disagree with your opinion on hacking into drones though. It would be possible to simulate an EMP blast on them or just have them auto self destruct. And while we all know that encryption is incredibly powerful we all also know that it is crackable. Why do you think the military has been so hesitant to invest a lot of money in unmanned attack drones. With our current enemies (i.e. low tech fanatics) attack drones are very powerful because they do not have the resources to do such a thing. Now lets say it was China? Lots of resources, lots of money, and LOTS of people. There is no doubt in my mind that they would find someway to disrupt the drones. Be it destruction of the satelites, jamming of frequencies, or cracking the encryption to cause disruption. There is no reason to take it over when causing it to destroy itself is enough. AI drones would also not be immune. There would have to be some way to communicate with the drone which means there is some opening to its AI routines. All it takes is a virus and the things become useless. And if the AI routines are advanced enough what about random "Ghost in the Shell" problems. Of course there may be enough protections to consider they above acceptable risks for the benefits gained. Food for thought bbarr97 |
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| Inert |
Posted on 21-01-2006 02:37
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Posts: 388 Joined: September 08 2005 |
(note: the word is "moot" and "mute") EMP blasts do not work in a vacuum, there is no way to capture high energy electrons and resonate them (which is how EMP is formed). And about cracking encrypted codes, I have no doubt in my mind that if the enemy was able to decrypt orders transferred on a weekly basis, then they should, without a doubt, be able to decrypt real orders sent by the opposing fleet, instead of wasting their time finding a way to decrypt messsages to drones. Simple drone command messages are not something worthwhile decrypting. As for viruses, refer to encryption above. I'd like to move away from discussing disruption techniques and move onto something else. Regardless of the outcome on encryption/hacking, there will still be drones in the universe. Discussing it is moot. What would not be moot is, as I pointed out earlier, is efficiency of said drones compared to humans. Edited by Inert on 21-01-2006 03:09 |
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| Itharu |
Posted on 21-01-2006 02:52
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Posts: 363 Joined: September 23 2005 |
Quote bbarr97 wrote: AI drones would also not be immune. There would have to be some way to communicate with the drone which means there is some opening to its AI routines. All it takes is a virus and the things become useless. And if the AI routines are advanced enough what about random "Ghost in the Shell" problems. Of course there may be enough protections to consider they above acceptable risks for the benefits gained. Food for thought bbarr97 A standalone AI would not need outside communication else that would entirely void the fact that it's AI. What I was trying to say with that point is that the AI pilot would be given orders and objectives and fall back plans which it would carry out and incase of anything that would suddenly happen on the battle feild, rely on collected data from the given situation and compare that to past combat data. Granted, it would make new systems have to rely on chances of survival to make 'veteran' AI systems and eventually all that combat data would have to be rest, but there's a level of refinement that can be produced from that. As to my ghost in the shell refrences, it appears you have not followed the show and payed attention to the Tachikomas (Sentiant Tanks). What the movie had to deal with is an AI system that developed a desire and need for self preservation via a merging of data instead of a replication of data. As well I read a book that included 'Borderline Intelligence', robots and systems that generally made assumptions requiring confirmation based on signals from the people that they served. It wasn't well discribed, but it wasn't AI either. -Fear the Might of the Imperial Cortharian Fleet
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| zenprime |
Posted on 21-01-2006 12:26
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 Posts: 105 Joined: September 02 2005 |
Communications between drone units and drone units and controllers should be available. Though, once a unit has accepted a suicide command(triple check order authenticity internally, IFF, and location of friendly vessels[for safety issues and to identify point of transmission.]) unit deactivates com system, and at T-30 seconds from the point of no return(trajectory wise) the comm system is physically shorted out. I believe Drone systems should also have communications to coordinate strikes with other drone units, and have access to the more powerful FCS in mannel vessels.   Bring it on. I've mastered multiple forms of Pink! [small]Zenprime is dead. Well no |
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| bbarr97 |
Posted on 21-01-2006 15:31
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Posts: 8 Joined: January 18 2006 |
Quote Itharu wrote: As to my ghost in the shell refrences, it appears you have not followed the show and payed attention to the Tachikomas (Sentiant Tanks). What the movie had to deal with is an AI system that developed a desire and need for self preservation via a merging of data instead of a replication of data. As well I read a book that included 'Borderline Intelligence', robots and systems that generally made assumptions requiring confirmation based on signals from the people that they served. It wasn't well discribed, but it wasn't AI either. I have not seen "Ghost in a Shell" so I was going with what little I knew about it. In general though, the AI was doing something it wasn't particularly designed to do. I don't think discussing this will help answer the question of drone vs. human efficiency though. One thing I keep assuming is that a drone would be more maneuverable. With technology as advanced as it is would "inertial dampers" be a reality? That would alleviate the limitation that humans have in regards to G forces. A human could also react much better to situations were equipment is lost. If all else fails (radar, cameras, etc.) he still has his Mark 1 Mod 1 eyeball to save his hide. Additionally, if the fighter is destroyed it doesn't mean the pilot is dead because of escape pods. Got to admit it is still easier to just load up an AI than send out SAR for the missing pilots. Most seem to agree that a human would also be a better dogfighter than an AI drone. That just means we have to design the ship in such a way that many other tasks are automated or very simple in execution so the pilot can concentrate on putting weapons on target. |
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| Inert |
Posted on 21-01-2006 17:50
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Posts: 388 Joined: September 08 2005 |
There are inertial dampeners already present, but AFAIK they're in the prototype stages, along with gravimetric propulsion systems. Unfortunately, if your radar/sensor fail, you do fail as well. Imagine trying to visualize the enemy while moving a thousand meters per second. Even with sixty mph things start to get blurry for me. And you're covering what could be tens of kilometers, but the time you've spotted the enemy they're already 5 kilometers in back of you. |
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| Coolhand77 |
Posted on 22-01-2006 15:24
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Posts: 24 Joined: October 05 2005 |
Actually I would say with turreted weapons and self targeting/aiming munitions like missles and guided KE cannon rounds, using the AI for targeting and letting the pilot focus on evasion would be more likely. Let the pilot have a point weapon, or some weapons release capability (head tracking apature missles like the new AIM-9X sidewinders and a "knife fight" cannon) for targets of opportunity and dogfighing (two "people" shooting is always better than one) and let the AI gunner/bombideer focus on killing things. Thats how attack helicopter crews run it, as well as two man attack crews. Final launch authorization would be from the pilot's weapons release, but the AI can target, lock and prep the missile or whatever weaponsystem and then inform that everying is a go.
Wash - "This is going to get pretty interesting"
Mal - "Define Interesting" Wash - "Oh god, oh god, we're all going to die?" Still flying! |
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| Itharu |
Posted on 22-01-2006 16:33
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Posts: 363 Joined: September 23 2005 |
Ah for got to make the point of 'the human' factor in AI (robot) vs Human combat. Typically an AI has to work on pure logic and projections made from data it's given. That can lead to a predictable pattern in routines, or any of it's functions. Humans on the other hand have the advantage of being creative and unexpected, illogical if you will. So relying on that, there's always the potential for a human to win over an AI, so long as that AI keeps to following logic and whatever data it may be given. -Fear the Might of the Imperial Cortharian Fleet
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| Sun Tzu |
Posted on 22-01-2006 17:40
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Posts: 528 Joined: September 08 2005 |
Quote Good to know that switching control in the hw2 engine is not possible. So subverting control is a mute issue Not quite. It is possible to change control over a ship (in an other way than capture). For example it is possible to script a change of control over drones if they stay for a given time within a given range from a ship with specific ECM equipment. |
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| Inert |
Posted on 23-01-2006 02:16
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Posts: 388 Joined: September 08 2005 |
How so, Sun Tzu? (elaborate) |
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