The vision for war – from the 1930’s to now

The vision for science and war seems to have undergone a radical change from the 1930’s to the present. This change, pioneered by MIT applied mathematician Norbert Wiener, has essentially got to do with the introduction of cybernetics and its applications to war, thereby securing the crucial marriage between science and War, which was previously absent. This resulted in the battle being between machines acting like humans rather than human soldiers themselves. Let me explain.

Norbert Wiener, regarded by many as the father of cybernetics, introduced the idea of Cybernetics, or, the “science of control and regulation,” during the time he worked for the US defence in developing the radar-guided AA (anti-aircraft) gun. He studied the predictable behaviour of the human mind in stressed situations to help predict the path of the enemy aircraft, so that it could be gunned down efficiently. The most important aspect of this was the feedback loop running between the enemy pilot, the aircraft, the AA predictor and the AA operator. The actions of each member of the loop regulated the actions of the subsequent member of the loop. This allowed the replacement of man by machine and machine by man. The actions of the pilot, for example, could be predicted by a machine; hence the pilot was being viewed not as a human being with emotions and senses, but as a machine whose actions were predictable and somewhat pre-determined.

Thus, the use of cybernetics in warfare had one important result that would determine the vision for war in decades to come: scientific research would extensively be used in warfare and technology would become the single most crucial factor in determining victory in war. This was realised early on by Vannevar Bush, a visionary who united six thousand leading American scientists and coordinated their research in warfare. As the head of the Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb, he knew the importance of technology in warfare and this was what made him seek government funding in scientific research for warfare, which, when also adopted by nations worldwide, changed the war scenario. A battle between skilled human soldiers (1930’s) changed to a battle between intelligent machines.

Therefore, the change in warfare that we see from the 1930’s to now, most importantly, is the advent of technology in the warfare realm and the criterion for victory changing from skill, strength and size to technological advancement.

By Pranav R Kamat


References:
1. The Ontology of the Enemy: Norbert Wiener and the Cybernetic Vision by Peter Galison
2. The History and Development of Cybernetics - Presented by The George Washington University in Cooperation with The American Society for Cybernetics