Marvel and Body Armor for Women

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You may not be aware that the issue of body armor for women and how you deal with those women of various breast sizes is a somewhat controversial or at least ongoing topic.  The history of this goes way back and includes rumors from the greeks about how the Amazons in the 5th century BC dealt with the issue.  

 

On a more directly sexist note, the dubious choices made by fantasy illustrators whose heroines have somewhat preposterous bosoms and even more preposterous bodice / body armor has long been noted by teenage boys in the 1920s through to the present day.

 

Marvel has entered into this fashion dialog by proposing a sensible yet imposing solution for the TVA operatives (Time Variance Authority) who enforce the laws and repress deviance from the "Sacred Timeline".  This is from the first episode of Loki (2021). 

 

Remember for body armor to be reasonable, it has to be comfortable enough to wear for a long time, certainly all day.  Yikes, that must be annoying.

 

This is the Marvel proposal.  It doesnt look all that comfortable but at least it is not overtly decorative.  It looks functional. 

 

 

 Here are two examples of body armor from concept sketches found on the Internet.

                                        

 

I am not sure that either of the two above are practical and look more like parade armor to me, e.g. the armor used in presentations, not battle.

I will spare you some of the more egregious, often bikini-inspired, concepts in this area.

Rumors of War October 2016

Lets now move beyond the grim reality of the collapse of our political system, and lighten things up around here by considering whether or not we are on the brink of another serious regional or world war. Not only is this a very reasonable time to ask such questions, it also leads into the larger blog theme of “predicting the future”. In this case, no esoteric knowledge is necessary, we can rely on our own knowledge of history and what we can see of world events.

Whenever a war happens, there are always people who say that there were clear signs that the war was obviously going to happen and that either we should have been better prepared, or should have avoided it, or that the government knew it was going to happen and wanted it to happen, or any of a number of other opinions, some of them interesting, many of them completely out-of-their-mind crazy.

Hindsight is 20/20 but in the real world there are always tensions and conflicts that could explode into a major war. But it also the case that there are a variety of “indicators” that a war may be on the horizon. Here are a few drawn from recent history: (a) a nation is pursuing what it sees to be a goal of critical national importance and another nation executes economic sanctions (war) against it, (b) a nation is executing a rearmament of their armed forces as fast as they possibly can, (c) a nation executes an intense intelligence attack on another nation with whom they are at peace of a size that is unparalled in peacetime, (d) a nation insists that it controls another nation's territory or that a formerly public right-of-way is declared to be their sovereign territory, and always has been.

Do we see any of these four situations in the world today? In fact, we see all four of these.

Russia has a centuries long relationship with Ukraine and Crimea. They see that relationship differently than we do. For them, Crimea is the ice-free port that Russia strategically requires. For them, Ukraine is a slavic territory that has been part of Russia for centuries. The very origins of Moscow and Russia can be traced to Kievan Rus in what we might now call Ukraine. The west has imposed sanctions on Russia for the events in that part of the world. Right or wrong, these sanctions are certainly hurting Russia.

Both Russia and China are extensively rearming and reconfiguring their armed forces. The Russian army, navy and air force seem to be rebuilding at a vastly increased rate. China is doing something similar.

For the last decade, China has executed a cyber-attack against the United States of unprecedented scope. The only people who do not know it at this point are people who are really not paying attention (or don't want to know). The US Government has given every indication that it knows and that it wants it to stop. We know that something has been going on in part because our country has begun an immense investment in offensive and defensive cyberwar.

China's actions in the South China Sea are about as aggressive as a nation can be in times of peace. It is a setup for a hot war, and they are arming for it. They want it, they need it, they have to have it. And if we don't like it, we have to fight for it. The problem is not what we want, the problem is what all China's neighbors want and we are in a mutual defense alliance with those neighbors. Probability of war? High, about as high as war between India and Pakistan, for example.

Oh, did I forget to mention India and Pakistan?  Or India and China?  Or Vietnam and China? Or Pakistan's financing of terrorist groups? The war in Syria and the refugee crisis? Russia's blatant cyberwar against America? N. Korea and its nuclear weapons? Russia and Chechnya (what's left of it)? Or the Congo? Or Somalia? Or Sudan? Or Libya?

So are we headed to world war? Not necessarily. After all, even a hot regional war does not imply a world war.  But if we do end up in a major world war, there will be people who say that there was plenty of evidence that it was on the horizon.

This topic continues here.

Lethal Autonomous Vehicles, Morality and Closing an Important Loophole that Allows Opportunity for the Poor

I was very impressed that Dr. Stuart Russell of the Univ of California called for scientists to boycott work on lethal autonomous weapons systems, e.g. autonomous vehicles that kill people.  But it also seems to me that it is mighty late in the day to raise this concern.  Why?

Because the Artificial Intelligence community was substantially, if not entirely, financed by the Department of Defense for the first 50 or so years of its life.  Yes, there has been some private financing, and NSF financing, probably more today than there has ever been.  But if you look at the history of the field, it is the DOD through DARPA and similar agencies that found the money to support the idea and stick by it through decades of early work, long before it had practical applications.

Now, it does not take a lot of imagination or even a PhD to realize that the DOD's interest in AI would include completely autonomous and lethal weapon systems.  There would be many obstacles on the way to that of course, but ultimately that would be one of the goals of financing this very early stage technology.   There were and will continue to be issues of what sorts of controls need to be on such systems, e.g. when they can be used to assist humans in these weapon systems and when they can be allowed to act "on their own" through rules and systems that are programmed into them.   The issue of validation of such systems and what it means on the battlefield when some of the players are not so conscientious about validation is a major concern.  And now is a good time to be concerned because while full autonomy may or may not be imminent, it is certainly much more imminent than it was 20 years ago.

Of course it needs discussion.

I find it intriguing that even unmanned drones are so controversial, they are far from autonomous but seem to raise strong opinions among the public.   I would not have particularly guessed that, given that each of these drones has a human or two at all times managing their progress.  But it is a concern and no doubt truly autonomous drones and vehicles will be as well.

Remember also that pretty much anything that moves can be lethal whether or not that is its primary purpose. Even the most docile and friendly autonomous vehicle could hurt someone by running into them at full speed, or dropping on them, even if they are only being affectionate and happy to see you.

But getting back to AI and its funding, is it really fair to rely for decades on a source of  funding, knowing full well why they were funding you, and then balking when you start to see results?   

Of course there is nothing unique in this situation to the field of AI.  Many technologies started out as DOD financed in their early stages only to move beyond that into other areas of financing and application.  Some scientists find the knowledge that they are being funded by the DOD morally objectionable and choose to avoid such financing, and that is certainly their right, even though some of us can be a little cynical about whether the NSF is really all that different from the DOD.  They are both financed after all by the same Congress, the same government, the same national will.  Nevertheless, if they prefer their filthy lucre laundered through the NSF that is OK with me. AI is only exceptional in that it is one area that has required more years of development to enter the practical zone of mere applications than many other advanced technologies.  It has required more nurturing and more faith on the part of the organizations that finance research.  And for decades that pretty much was only the DOD, at least to a large degree.

At this point, I would need to review the history of funding of AI and related technologies in order to make sure I am on firm ground.  What I am describing here is an impression from the late last century.  These impressions are almost certain to be out of date, at least partially.  AI has moved from blue sky research to practical applications in many areas.

But there is a good reason to oppose this work, this inhuman autonomy, although I am not sure that there are any AI researchers who are aware of it.

The reason is that throughout history, one of the very few avenues for advancement allowed to poor people in most countries is through the military. Certain civilizations were famous for this, including the Romans and our fair country.  Although officers were generally drawn almost exclusively from the upper classes, a capable young man without pedigree could often join the military and at the risk of his life and hardship, daring and luck,  find a way to advance himself and his family out of the grinding poverty they were condemned to by circumstances of their birth.   In the case of the Romans, there are various cities around the Mediterranean that are the direct descendants of some of these soldiers when they were given land at the end of their years of service.

I am not advocating anything about the military in this essay, for or against, but merely pointing out that historically the military has been a way for the poor and disenfranchised to advance themselves and have a better life in their otherwise corrupt and wealth-privileged society.  As part of that I think it is also fair to ask whether the use of autonomous vehicles, and autonomous robots of other kinds, will reduce this "demand for labor", one of the few channels of advancement available to the poor.  Of course it will.  In fact, that is probably one of the reasons for doing this development, people being so expensive to maintain.

As for the morality of computer scientists who choose to work on autonomous lethal weapons, I have mixed feelings.   Just because so much of the technology and computer industry was financed by the Dept of Defense does not mean that everyone should choose to stay on that path.  Of course not.  Perhaps it is sufficient to just acknowledge the past, thank those that had faith and move on.  There will presumably be enough people to develop the technologies that the DOD and Congress, who funds all these things, desires while the University spits on their benefactors and the academics within hold themselves so preciously aloof.

You may read an article about this call here:

http://phys.org/news/2015-05-ai-expert-colleagues-autonomous-killer.html

The Case for Nuclear Weapons in Space

Warning: Although not named, this essay contains implied spoilers for a recent alien invasion movie.

Although peaceniks were until recently salivating at the mouth at the prospect of disarming the West of its strategic deterrence recent events in alien invasion motion pictures have changed all that. In a stunning reversal of the debate, the US Congress has joined the US Air Force in calling for increased preparedness to deal with a potential alien invasion augmented by the ability to control time to their advantage.

The debate was set off by a recent Hollywood film in which the alien menace combined fabulous tactical ability in the form of their aerial-capable, amphibious-capable, underground-capable foot soldiers controlled by an all-knowing, all-seeing time control master alien with the power to reverse time by a day or two to replay events until things go its way. Although the movie has a human getting a bit of this power by accident and using it to heroically save the world from the implacable alien menace, authoritative military sources suggest that is not very likely in the real world. “No offense to Tom Cruise,” said General Wm. Shelton, commander of the US Air Force Space Command, “But I think it would be a bad move on our part to place the hope of all mankind on the heroics of a glorified press agent and one good special forces person who whacks aliens with a propeller.  What this country needs, what this planet needs, is a serious contingency plan to deal with this threat.”

Gen Shelton talking to reporters about the implacable alien menace

This time-manipulation capability has caused a radical rethink in the strategies that might counteract the alien menace. It would not be sufficient to merely nuke the aliens over a period of a day or even an hour, sources explained. “The way this works is you would have to be certain to get the main bad guy on the very first blast, even though you do not know where it is exactly. All you know is roughly what continent it is on. Its not enough to nuke Berlin, and then Paris, and then inbetween. If you set off one blast even a few minutes before the one that kills the main bad guy then the bad guy will just reset time a few days earlier but now it knows what happens and you don't. So you have to be certain to nuke that continent hard, from top to bottom, being sure to hit it so hard that it wipes out alien life no matter where it is or how far underground. You only get one shot at this.“

“This means that the weapons would have to be synchronized within a few seconds of each other, and with essentially no warning”, Gen Shelton explained. “The only way to do that is to preposition weapons in space by the hundreds if not thousands of the most deadly weapons that we have. Missiles would not be enough to guarantee a short enough warning period and the ability to carpet bomb an entire continent simultaneously. To defeat this alien we have to be able to turn a continent instantly into radioactive slag”.

Industry observers noted that this is not the first time a policy of nuclear weapons in space has been advocated by an important movie about aliens. In the Jim Cameron film Aliens (1986), the civilian Ripley famously advises “Lets nuke them from orbit. Its the only way to be sure”.

US Air Force Space Command

http://www.afspc.af.mil/