Smart machin for battle

Some jobs will require humans to collaborate with smart machines where they are able to advance in their role much more quickly, he said. “So think about a doctor who is able to use a smart machine to keep abreast of the deluge of medical literature and updates that are published.

“Quite frankly a human has a very difficult time practising medicine and staying up to date on all of the findings, whether those are in medical journals or clinical trials or advances in technology and medicines.”

Clerical type workers are also likely to be threatened by smart machines, he said. “If you are a law clerk or someone in a law firm who does discovery, perhaps that’s one of the functions where smart machines will negatively impact your career.”

Automation will also branch out beyond its typical place in manufacturing, defence and agriculture, Brant said. For example, automated dispensing machines for medicines and robotic pharmacies are taking off, he said.

“There’s also the consumer-oriented robot that is kind of like a home companion. These are more popular in Japan then they are in the west. They are used to do work around the house, and it’s much more general purpose than the purpose-built [machines] in manufacturing or defence.”

When it comes to driverless cars, Alistair Leathwood, executive director at TNS Australia, sees more countries undergoing trials such as the UK in January 2015. He said Australia may also follow and trial driverless cars.

“I don’t think you are going to see anything like mass market driverless cars in Australia next year, but I think you might well see a few trials.

“Countries are passing laws in preparation for an environment that might happen in the future, and that feels like a sensible, proactive action. It feels a bit like when governments got together to agree what would happen to mine on the moon, it’s not because it’s about to happen, it’s because you probably should have a set of rules in place for when it does happen,” he said.

Sheedy doesn’t see driverless cars on Australian roads next year, as the country’s manufacturing sector has taken its toll over the last couple years.

“Without a manufacturing capability in Australia, who is going to be running those trials? It probably won’t be Google; they won’t bring their car out to Australia. And why would BMW or Ford or something choose Australia when they’ve got many other lucrative markets around the globe to roll these out in?”

Leathwood pointed out there are cars, which have been around for a few years, that warn the driver if he/she starts drifting off the road or lane. The logical extension of that, he said, is to have the car intervene and know where the middle of the lane is to get the driver safely back on track.

“At the moment, that is mostly done through sensors, immediate sensors on the car scanning the immediate environment. When you start to combine the immediate sensors with some sophisticated GPS so it knows at a macro level where it is, it’s perfectly possible,” Leatherwood said.

Drones or unmanned aerial vehicles that deliver goods to consumers will become more popular now that Amazon and Coca-Cola have trailed this, Leatherwood said. This could particularly take off in Australia, as the minimum wage rates are quite high compared to other western countries, he said.

The First Battle of Things

Gartner research predicts that by 2018, the first “battle of things” will occur between autonomous drones and robots leveraging machine intelligence, advanced tactics, advanced communications and advanced weapons. According to Jorge Lopez, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner, technologically advanced nations will hold advantages over those that rely on the deployment of purely human armies, and those advanced nations will incur many fewer human casualties on the battlefield. Warfare strategy will pivot around two points: the advancing capabilities of machine intelligence, and the emergence of prototypes that may tend to go outside their intended behaviour

Additionally, the role of IT in defence planning will take on a new significance. The much higher speed of machine intelligence will make it impossible for humans to intervene in a meaningful manner without causing great peril. Threats that materialise at the speed of machine intelligence will need a supervisory machine intelligence that can intervene if it deems it appropriate.

Robots Get Smart

As machine intelligence advances the development of things, we will see more sophisticated intelligence incorporated into robots. Robots will possess the intelligence to go into war and use a combination of artificial and human-oriented knowledge to wage battle. Battles will take place, and will be operated, entirely by autonomous robots and drones using highly sophisticated weapons, including cyber warfare tools, advanced technology weapons and advanced communication. Human soldiers will rarely be involved.

This rapid technology advancement will transform military planning. The roles of IT professionals will gain new significance for government and military agencies; as they need to create and shape these intelligence defence systems. And the technology-savvy defence specialists — designers — will have more leeway and flexibility in planning battle strategy. Of course, many of these autonomous robots will have advantages over human opponents, and the story of how this advances is still to be written.