Flickr user Nevada Tumbleweed has been posting dozens of pics from the 1953 nuclear cannon test, and they're as notable for the beautifully clunky 1950s hardware as for the actual devastation of the nuclear shell, detonated just 500 feet above the ground. And I feel really bad for the soldiers crouching in the trench nearby — I don't think that trench turned out to be all that helpful. More at the link. [Nevada Test Site - Operation Upshot-Knothole - 1953 on Flickr]

The cannon itself
That fireball
Soldier standing guard to make sure nobody wanders into the blast zone
More security
The weather service tracks the toxic clouds to see where they go
A pilot-less "drone" aircraft
Soldiers "duck and cover" in a trench
A WB29 aircraft being checked for radioactivity. Planes that had radioactive contamination were washed with a solution of "gunk," plus grease solvent and water, then returned to duty 24 hours later.
A B45 tornado.

The latest round of commercials for the United States Air Force play on the theme "It's Not Science Fiction," portraying Air Force missions and technologies as something out of military science fiction. One even shows off the Space Command, although this one doesn't appear to involve Stargates or preparations against an alien invasion.

Another ad spotlights the Unmanned Aircraft Systems, with a desert mission seeing support from a spy plane.

Another spot imagines the Air Force's combat, search and rescue airmen parachuting onto an alien world.

US Air Force Not Science Fiction [The Inspiration Room]

Today's drone aircraft can stay in the air for 18 hours and be controlled from a base miles away.

Top image: Israeli-made drone plane that Israel has started supplying to Germany for surveillance missions in Afghanistan.

All photos by AP.

NASA's version of the Air Force's drone aircraft, for use in scientific studies — it'll sample greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

NASA's version of the Air Force's drone aircraft, for use in scientific studies — it'll sample greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

A target drone made by Abu Dhabi company ATS, on display at a Paris air show.

An MQ-9 Reaper drone plane, of the type most likely being used to scout for Somali pirates in the Seychelles right now.

The ominously named Predator B, which the U.S. is using to scout along the U.S./Canadian border, looking for drug and cigarette smuggling. So don't try and sneak any ciggies in from Vancouver, or you'll meet... Predator B!

Another picture of Predator B. It should really be a hip-hop star.

Jon Ronson, who wrote the book The Men Who Stare at Goats, has taken over the Guardian's film section this week, and asked former Lieutenant Colonel Jim Channon, one of the inspirations behind The Men Who Stare at Goats, write a few columns about the film and his ideas. Channon authored the First Earth Battalion manual, which proposed that the US Army modernize warfare by looking toward the human potential movement. Channon suggested engaging the enemy with positive vibrations and offerings of peace, but also suggested that soldiers unlock their potential by practicing meditation and yoga, and that work to develop superhuman abilities such as perceiving auras, teleportation, psychokinesis, and precognition. Ronson discusses Channon's parapsychology in his book, and many of Channon's ideas found their way into the film.

In his columns, Channon says that he doesn't mind that his ideas are being presented as comedy (he calls it "the ultimate roast"), and is just happy that they've enjoyed such a long shelf life. After all, he still believes that the ideas he lays out in the First Earth Battalion are still important in the modern age. Modern warfare, he notes, is still extremely violent and psychologically scarring. He believes that, by opening up their perceptions, soldiers can avoid situations where they might be in physical danger or risk killing another human being. But he also believes that harnessing those paranormal abilities is important in all walks of life:

Another important idea about the paranormal is that it is currently one of the most overlooked skillsets in modern life. We must awaken to the possibility that the most important single advance the human race can make to enter this century where we engage the galaxy and all of its mysteries will require we become adept at moving through dimensions of many kinds. We must tend to our interdimensional world.

While the Army may not have embraced his pacifist parapsychology (though it has employed some of his psychological techniques), Channon has found success in the corporate world. In more recent years, Channon has billed himself as a "strategic shaman," working with companies like AT&T, DuPont, Shell, Whirlpool, and even the US Army Corps of Engineers.

Jon Ronson Takeover [Guardian via The Daily Grail]

Dando writes, in part:

At the 4th European Symposium on Non-Lethal Weapons in 2007, researchers from the Institute of Experimental Medicine and Charles University in Prague described the effects on macaque monkeys of combinations of drugs that produce a rapid loss of aggressive behaviour. They argued that the drugs could be "used to pacify aggressive people during ... terrorist attacks". The same researchers have also investigated methods of aerosol delivery to human volunteers.

Those who support the development of incapacitating agents often argue that using them in conflict situations stops people being killed. Historical evidence suggests otherwise. At the Nord-Ost siege, for instance, terrorists exposed to the fentanyl mixture were shot dead rather than arrested. Likewise, in Vietnam, the US military used vast quantities of CS gas - a 'non-lethal' riot-control agent - to increase the effectiveness of conventional weapons by flushing the Viet Cong out of their hiding places.
Blind to misuse

The lack of engagement with this issue among life scientists in general is alarming. Some companies are already marketing oxytocin on the back of studies showing that a nasal squirt of the hormone increases trust in humans. Even though the effectiveness of commercial sprays is doubtful, such research opens up the possibility of a drug that could be used to manipulate people's emotions in a military context. Discussions with more than 2,000 practising life scientists in 13 countries over the past few years have taught me that few have considered such possible uses of their work.

It's worth reading Dando's entire editorial - it's full of interesting facts about the use of biological weapons, as well as details about biologists who are currently complicit in weaponizing their neuroscience discoveries. It's one thing to consciously choose to create biological weapons, but Dando points out that one of the worst problems is scientists who never contemplate the military implications of their work. That's why his discussion above about oxytocin is so disturbing - these researchers never think about how their discoveries, in the wrong hands, might be used for torture, interrogation, or worse.

Biologists Napping While Work Militarized via Nature

Image by J. Field

In a first for a major movie, four of the five branches of America's military participated in the production of Michael Bay's mechanical melodrama sequel - The Coast Guard being the missing military, thereby robbing us of any chance of seeing action like this - something that Army Lt. Col. Greg Bishop feels is as close to realism as a movie like this can get:

This is probably the largest joint-military movie ever made... If you go down the list of military movies, ‘Black Hawk Down' was just about all Army, ‘Top Gun' was all Navy, ‘Iron Man' was predominantly Air Force [but, in reality, s]oldiers on the ground love to look up in the sky and see fighter jets over their shoulder... In ‘Transformers,' we're fighting alien robots, so realism is obviously out the window [but if it were to happen] this is how we'd do it.

Said realism comes, in part, from Harry Humphries, a retired Navy SEAL who has consulted with Bay on movies since 1996's The Rock:

Michael initially had a typically Hollywood attitude toward how things should look, but he's learned a lot in 10 years... I would say [Bay's 2001 historical drama] ‘Pearl Harbor' was his turning point.

Of course, there's a secondary benefit to such verismilitude in filmmaking for the military: using the movies as advertisements. Bishop, again:

I suspect most American citizens could never accurately describe what it's like to be a soldier in today's Army. They get their perception of the Army through the media, so our job is to educate the American people on who we are.

It's something that the Air Force's deputy director of public affairs, Captain Bryon McGarry, agrees with:

Recruiting and deterrents are secondary goals, but they're certainly there.

Film biz, military unite for mutual gain [Variety]

Indeed, Wolverine is in some ways a version of Rambo, with its ripped hero who has been abandoned by his government and forced to go mercenary for justice. And who would deny seeing glints of Apocalypse Now in Watchmen's war scenes with the Comedian? The two movies even use the same music in their soundtracks, to much the same effect: Brooding 60s protest music hovers over scenes of state-sanctioned violence, reminding us that all oppression spawns a counterculture.

Though the last few years have seen the release of a few stately war movies like Letters from Iwo Jima and Flags of Our Fathers, as well as some serious gut-punchers like Black Hawk Down and Jarhead. But these films treat war as historical drama, or as pure clusterfuck. There is little of the classic war film here, where the horror and madness of combat (or imprisonment) become an occasion to tell stories of loyalty and tragic sacrifice.

But if you want those themes, you can find them in Wolverine, which despite its cheesiness does make an effort to give us the soldier's eye view. And although he skirts madness, Logan is clearly focused on finding justice. Likewise, Watchmen shows us the way soldiers (in this case, the superheroes who work for the US government) transcend the horror of their circumstances through loyalty. Like many war movies made after the 1970s, however, Watchmen takes a jaundiced view of the soldiering life. Just as we do in Apocalypse Now, we see how a hypocritical government drives its troops mad and turns loyalty into a joke.

And if you want a truly brilliant war movie, check out Iron Man. Its ironic triumphalism reminded me of the underrated movie Lord of War, about the rise and fall of a big time weapons smuggler. Iron Man takes us back to classic war films of the John Wayne variety, but with a 21st Century liberal twist. Iron Man revels in weapons technology, and at many points suggests that the US needs to get more involved in Middle East conflicts. But it also delivers a requisite "war is hell" message, giving its defense industry magnate a change of heart when he realizes that his mega-weapons are falling into the wrong hands. (There's actually a similar set of scenes in Lord of War, which are truly intense.)

While the most recent Hulk film was uneven and ultimately unsuccessful, I'd still claim it as another war film - similar in tone to Full Metal Jacket (though nowhere near as good). Unabashedly liberal, its the tale of a man swept up by a war machine that uses him and finally drives him completely insane.

Later this summer, expect more another superhero war movie: G.I. Joe is coming in August.

Why has the superhero movie come to be one of the only places we can find intriguing stories about war? Possibly it's just coincidence: the US is at war, and we're also in a phase where comic book movies are incredibly popular at the box office. So naturally we tell comic book war stories. Moreover, it's a lot safer to tell war stories when they're safely cloaked in a fantasy: Often, we can convey emotional truths more clearly when they're hidden behind a mask (perhaps a superhero mask).

I also think there's something to be said for the idea that war itself - filled with robots, autonomous vehicles, smart armor, and high tech surveillance devices - has become more like comic books. This comes from an idea that Peter Singer suggested in his new book Wired for War, which is about cutting-edge weapons tech. Singer writes that new weapons tech removes soldiers from the battlefield, turning warfare into what feels like a videogame. And turning some soldiers into people with superpowers.

Perhaps, as combat technologies advance, we'll it will become almost impossible to distinguish between comic book movies and what used to be war movies. I wonder what we'll lose when that happens.

Until now, the idea of the use of robots on the battlefield has been the stuff of science fiction - which is alluded to heavily throughout Singer's analysis. He and the subjects he interviews have learned about warfare from science fiction. Indeed, the book opens with a reference to the current version of Battlestar Galactica, and quickly follows with a number of references to Star Wars, Star Trek, Terminator, the Matrix, and the works of Isaac Asimov.

Looking at the promotional blurbs for this book, one would expect this to be a fairly straightforward concept - an examination of the rise of the use of robots in warfare, some of the history and how this is impacting the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. The assumption fell impressively flat as I worked my way through the book, because not only is the concept of robotic warfare covered, but Singer also goes beyond the battlefields and world of today and leaps forward into the next twenty five years. While at times very alarmist, Singer paints a frightening view of the future.

At the beginning of the current Middle East conflicts post-9/11, the US military entered war as a technologically advanced army, but it did so without the use of robotics. Singer traces the beginnings of the introduction of such robots as the now-familiar Predator Drone and the Packbot, among others, from their conception on the drawing board to their gaining attention from the military to their widespread use today on the battlefields. Singer interviewed hundreds of people for this book, from the technicians who built and repair the robots, to the Privates and Sergeants who deploy and depend upon them to the ranking officers who oversee their use against enemy forces. In doing so, Singer outlines an impressive sub-story of the perceptions of warfare on the part of the United States, going back to earlier wars.

To some extent, it's unclear where Singer falls when it comes to robotics. On one hand, he demonstrates just how we have come to depend upon the intelligence and abilities that robots offer our fighting forces. On the other hand, we see a trend of a highly technical and advanced military, with a public that is increasingly withdrawing from the necessary pains of warfare. We are, he worries, becoming inured to the horrors of war because robots allow us to distance ourselves from the action.

However, there is also an argument to be made that warfare has always tended towards distancing soldiers from the action. In conflicts past, massed infantry forces would clash, with horrendous injuries and trauma ensuing. As time progressed, warfare became far more distant - the introduction of the Long Bow, for example, allowed English archers to hit targets from further away, transforming the battlefield from a massed infantry and cavalry force to one that was capable of striking from a distance. The same goes for the introduction of gunpowder, with allowed for an entire revolution in how militaries were organized and trained. The Civil War, Napoleonic War and World War I all introduced, to varying degrees, an element of mechanization to warfare, which further placed warfare away from the soldiers, who could now hold off battalions with an entrenched squad and a machine gun. Still further up the timeline, with the introduction of airpower, theorists became increasingly convinced that warfare would become even more impersonal, as militaries could bomb enemy civilian populations with little risk to their own forces before ending a conflict. While this turned out to be not the case, it is interesting to note that with the further introduction of technology to a battlefield, war has reached the ultimate impersonal level, as our own soldiers can direct robotic forces into danger.

While robots are extremely advantageous in combat, they have the effect of sanitizing warfare, while enraging our enemies abroad. I recall a documentary that I watched by New York film maker Eugene Jarecki, Why We Fight, which noted that with the numerous advances in warfare, it becomes far easier to wage, and in a scenario where soldiers are able to fight with lessened risk, this has frightening possibilities. What would happen if a military force could field an army of robots? Singer notes the scary possibility that in today's media-rich environment, there is the possibility that people will go to war because there are few immediate consequences.

Singer also does not ignore the time-honored notion of a robotic rebellion, a scenario where robots realize that they are able to do far better than we can, and seek to become a dominant race on the planet. This has happened in countless films and movies, and at a couple of points, soldiers and scientists note that they are working on robots that could someday overthrow humanity. While his subjects say this in jest, there is an element of truth to it. Singer notes several instances of robotic systems going haywire, from a robot in a car factory killing a worker by mistake, to South African automated gun turret suffering from a computer glitch that caused it to open fire on soldiers during a series of wargames, killing several before it ran out of ammunition. Singer also examines the increasing influence that technology has on our lives, from Play Stations to iPods, and how these systems have influenced soldiers on the ground. Playing videogames generally helps soldiers adapt very quickly to robotic systems, to the point where controls are modeled after gaming controls.

Military historians often talk about three generations of warfare: First generation, which includes massed manpower as a dominant element; second generation, which includes firearms; and third generation, maneuver warfare, which links coordinated manpower and mechanized forces, and is widely in use today. In the past two decades, there has been much debate over the possibility of a fourth generation of warfare emerging, largely thought to be a sort of urban warfare that pits highly trained specialist-soldiers against irregular forces.

However, while observing the trends of the past conflicts from the Gulf War, Somalia, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan, I would propose that Singer's strength in this book is that he's defining a fourth generation of warfare, characterized by the use of computers on the battlefield. (Urban and guerilla warfare have been in use since antiquity.) Singer notes that in addition to robotic forces, the lines of communication between soldiers and their chain of command is changing with the introduction of computers. This essentially lifts the so-called fog of war, and gives battlefield commanders an unprecedented view of the battlefield, aided by the use of robotic drones and sensors. This brings forth an entirely new set of problems with the existing chains of command.

Singer and his interview subjects predict that the floodgates have opened, and there is essentially no turning back at this stage. Within the next twenty-five years, human soldiers will be fighting alongside humanoid robots, which will have extraordinary accuracy and initiative in how they react to enemy combatants. While we are certainly nowhere near that level of sophistication yet, the bulding blocks are already there: Robotic turrets shoot down mortar shells with impressive accuracy, and sensors can now tap into body language and other subtle elements to predict actions.

With issues such as global warming, fluctuations in the world economy, and an increasingly high-tech, worker-unfriendly world, Singer predicts that the future will only bring more conflict, and the U.S. will be involved to some degree. It is in this environment that robots will continue to fight for us.

Robots may not take over the planet, but there will be machines designed to be very good at killing humans. While there might be soldiers controlling elements of these systems, there is plenty of room for error. Still, if the future Singer predicts comes to pass, I am somewhat ready to hand over the keys to robot overlords - on the condition that we're allowed to keep our entertainment and food. They certainly can't do any worse than we have during our time on the planet.

Wired for War via Amazon

Image of PackBot from PackBot Page, and Predator Drone via jamesdale10 on Flickr.

The experiment, dubbed the Future Immersive Training Environment (FITE) Joint Capability Technology Demonstration (JCTD), will be, according to the ONR:

A critical, one-of-a-kind futuristic training program in which warfighters would train here at home in preparation for the types of small, urban and borderless conflicts that have spread throughout the middle east and other regions of the world . . . [it will be] a realistic, live-action virtual environment, that provides warfighter trainees feedback that allows for combined arms integration.

Apparently it will emphasize the "human" side of warfare, which is an odd assertion to make about a computer simulation.

Navy researcher George Solhan said the goal is to create "physically and mentally adaptable joint warriors winning and surviving in all phases of warfare." It's fascinating that as warfare becomes more virtual, via robots and UAVs, training also becomes more virtual. I'm curious about how Solhan believes a videogame-style simulation will create "physically adaptable" warriors - is this game sort of Guitar Hero-ish, or Dance Dance Revolutiony with a foot pad?

If $36 million sounds like a huge budget to you, consider that Grand Theft Auto IV cost $100 million. Final Fantasy XII cost $35 million.

SOURCE: Office of Naval Research

Image via US Dept of Defense

UPDATE: What might this virtual reality system look like? It may be similar to an immersive training program that the Navy created last year. Here's a description of that one:

Trainees use their regular tactical equipment, but weapons are modified to shoot special effects small arms marking system (SESAMS) rounds, which are similar in concept to paintball rounds. Trainees and role players use paintball masks for added protection. As the trainees move from room to room, they may encounter live role players or virtual characters. Occasionally, pyrotechnics are used to increase realism.

Read more about that via the US Navy. (Thanks to commenter Ghost in the Machine.)

In a terrifically intriguing - and occasionally frustrating - interview with Mother Jones, Singer says:

There was an editorial in the Washington Post this month that talked about how we should do something in Darfur with unmanned machines. Now, let's leave aside the irony of a humanitarian intervention done by an inhuman machine. What we overlook too often is that military operations are not simply throwaway commitments, even with machines. They involve you in something that is complex and long-term on the ground.

Read the whole interview to see what he says about how the military uses science fiction as an inspiration for their war machines, and to get a better sense of why Singer is worried about deploying robots instead of humans in war zones.

Should You Fear the Killer Robots? [via Mother Jones]

New Scientist has a nice gallery up featuring some of the machines the F.B.I. is deploying to Washington, D.C. According to Subtopia's Bryan Finoki, "DC officials fessed to dolling out roughly $50m, while Maryland and Virginia both have pitched in another $12-16m each."

While the robot waits patiently above, another bomb squad vehicle carries this explosion containment device. Stick the bomb inside, and hopefully it will go off without doing as much damage. Check out more mobile defense labs in this gallery.

According to Danger Room, which got a copy of the report, conference attendees agreed that:

In the operational environment of 2030 and beyond, the destructive/disruptive capability of the individual and small group will be more effective, more lethal, more easily developed/acquired, more efficiently delivered, and more easily concealed and transported... Individuals with access to the global information grid can easily acquire the knowledge needed to develop lethal bio agents, literally in their kitchen sink. Nanotechnology and robotics will offer opportunities to introduce and spread bio and chemical agents into targeted populations.

So, power to the lone nanohackers.

Read more at Danger Room, or just go to the report.

Wired's Noah Shachtman has a great post on this over at Danger Room, explaining how it fits into the Air Force's broader strategy to engage with people online and "counter negative opinions" about the armed services. I applaud the military for encouraging its officers and enlisted people to communicate more online - nothing wrong with using blogs for public debate. But there is just something FUBAR about how the Air Force can turn anything into a rigid and overly-complicated flow chart - even the act of chatting informally online.

via Danger Room

In an interview with military blog Defense Tech, the Army's Director of Research and Laboratory Management, Dr. John Parmentola described the military versions of some of the most advanced technology in development right now. For example, using electrical signals from the brain to control a wheelchair or output words to a computer is the civilian way of doing things. The Army envisions soldiers in contant, silent communication with each other, with the ability to silently activate and control machines just by thinking about it. That's a sci-fi action movie script that pretty much writes itself.

The quantum ghost effect is a little tougher to explain. Basically, you've got photons that pass across a smoke-obscured battlefield and simultaneously are and are not reflected by the smoke. Special computers could see through the smoke by taking advantage of the quantum link between both versions of the photons. Call it "Schrödinger's Howitzer."

Regarding the ultra-realistic holographic soldiers, the military wants them to act the part of enemies for more effective training exercizes. They can't just look real, though. They want AI that makes them act real. Dr. Parmentola seemed a bit credulous about the current state of development, however, saying, "I actually interact with virtual humans in terms of asking them questions and they're responding." Yeah, I was fooled by a bot on IM once too.

But what's this about World of Warcraft? The Army thinks online games are a perfect testing ground for their nascent AIs. They specifically mentioned WoW and EVE Online as games they want to infiltrate, sending in their "virtual soldiers" to see if they can deceive the human players. I think Blizzard should open up a bot only server.

Army Working On Science's Outer Limits. [Defense Tech]

The principle behind this tech is similar to the videogame headset you may have read about, as well as that voiceless phone-call experiment. “It will take a lot of research, and a lot of time,” says Mike D’Zmura, the lead scientist on the project at University of California at Irvine, “but there are also a lot of commercial applications, not just military applications.” Ah, but it’s the latter that provides the most fascinating, if alarming, potential. Allow us to take a look back at a few previous pipedreams and developments spearheaded by the government in the field of, um, ESP science.

LSD
The infamous Project MKULTRA, run by the CIA in the ’50s and ’60s, tapped into an array of drugs—heroin, weed, speed, shrooms—to illegally test its unwitting subjects. But it was the use of its most famous hallucinogen, LSD, that’s most captured the public’s mind.

THE GAY BOMB
According to the BBC, the Department of Defense had a brief flirtation with a six-year, $7.5 million project to craft aphrodisiacs that would embarrass enemy troops into submission. Although it sounds like some ignorant, paranoid, ridiculous McCarthy-era thinking, this was proposed circa 1994.

THE VOICE OF GOD
The mythic sonic projector directly aims its sound at just one person, who can receive a secret message or just go bananas from hearing voices. And it’s indeed becoming a reality, if that Paranormal State billboard stunt in Manhattan last year is any indication.

HANDS-OFF HYPNOSIS
The Army posted a “Voice-to-Skull” mockup on its site in May…then surreptitiously took it down. However, a sharp-shooting U.K. web page managed to capture the image, which appears to be plans for a “neuro-electromagnetic devise” that could, like the Voice of God, beam focused sounds through thin air to hypnotize its target. Curious.

TELEPATHIC RAY GUN
A report earlier this year revealed that the Army hoped (hopes?) to develop non-lethal weapons that discharge electromagnetic pulses that cause seizures as well as microwaves that transmit words into your ear and/or induce fevers.

Honorary, Tangential Mentions...

RAY GUNS OF PAIN
Taser, you got served. This device would shoot a non-lethal, invisible beam at an unsupecting victim, which is bound to fuck with the mind. But why take our word for it? Check the footage.

SLEEP-NO-MORE DRUGS
The use of non-addictive drugs like Modafinil/Provigil in undisclosed doses allows soldiers to supersize their ability to go without sleep for 40 hours at a time.

LSD image courtesy of romanedirisinghe

Starfleet Academy (Star Trek): Every galactic military, be it EarthForce or the Colonial Fleet, needs its officers school. But Starfleet Academy is the Harvard of the space age.

Who Gets In: Students who pass Starfleet's rigorous entrance exam complete the preparatory program. You would think saving the Enterprise every week would prepare you for that exam, but Wesley Crusher will tell you otherwise.

What You'll Study: Military strategy, archeology, the Prime Directive, how to handle a no-win scenario, parrises squares, and elitism.

Most Humiliating Moment: When the only person who will talk to you is Boothby, the groundskeeper.

Battle School (Ender's Game): The best hope against the alien Bugger threat, Battle School trains children for combat through a grueling physical war game. The best of the best are eligible for precommand training, and later Command School.

Who Gets In: Brilliant and charismatic six year-olds who stand their ground.

What You'll Study: Elementary education, plus games, zero gravity battle, and psychological warfare.

Most Humiliating Moment: When your homophobic classmates start calling you "Buttwatcher" (thanks, Orson Scott Card).

Sky High: With cliques, frustrated teachers, and unreasonable parental expectations, Sky High is like every other movie high school, but with superpowers.

Who Gets In: Super-powed teenagers of varying abilities.

What You'll Study: Hero support, mad science, and gym.

Most Humiliating Moment: When Bruce Campbell decides you aren't powerful enough to be a hero, and sticks you in sidekick classes.

Xavier Institute for Higher Learning (X-Men): Charles Xavier ensures that young mutants have a place where they can peacefully live, learn, and productively focus their powers.

Who Gets In: Mutants.

What You'll Study: Anti-Sentinel combat, team building, and the works of TH White.

Most Humiliating Moment: When you realize that whole "dog ate my homework" line doesn't work on telepaths.

Clone High: The Secret Board of Shadowy Figures cloned history's great innovators, explorers, and leaders and sent them to high school. Why? Because it's hilarious.

Who Gets In: The teenaged clones of famous historical figures, such as Abraham Lincoln, Joan of Arc, Cleopatra, JFK, and Mahatma Gandhi.

What You'll Study: The perils of sleep deprivation, the long term effects of smoking raisins, cultural equality, conflict mediation, and the power of the sweater vest.

Most Humiliating Moment: Prom.

The Academy (Firefly): It's the Alliance school where amygdalae go to die.

Who Gets In: Multi-talented supergeniuses whose parents don't ask too many questions.

What You'll Study: Mostly, you'll be studied, but you'll get plenty of hands-on experience in screaming, struggling, mind reading, and raving psychosis.

Most Humiliating Moment: When you peered into that obnoxious doctor's mind and revealed his deepest shame. That was embarrassing. For him.

Jedi Praxeum (Star Wars): After helping dismantle the Empire, Luke Skywalker starts to repopulate the Jedi order by building a school on Yavin 4.

Who Gets In: Admission is at Luke's whim.

What You'll Study: Lightsaber handling, diplomacy, meditation, and lifting objects with your mind.

Most Humiliating Moment: Returning to school after going through your awkward Dark Side phase.

Academy of Law (Judge Dredd): The Academy of Law molds the hyper-efficient, nigh-incorruptible Judges of Mega-City One.

Who Gets In: Mostly clones of current Judges and Academy cadets (or, as we might call them, "legacies"), although a few naturally-born child prodigies slip manage to slip in.

What You'll Study: Law, order, and psychological conditioning.

Most Humiliating Moment: There isn't one. Any embarrassing errors are grounds for expulsion.

Bene Gesserit Schools (Dune): These schools provide the training ground for the women who quietly pull the universe's political strings.

Who Gets In: Anyone with the ability or training, but it helps if you're female and a product of the order's breeding program.

What You'll Study: Obedience compulsion, petit perception, lie detection, metabolic control, martial arts, and the art of seduction.

Most Humiliating Moment: Potentially graduation. When you ingest the extremely toxic spice melange, you'll transform into a Reverend Mother if you've mastered your arts, and die if you haven't. At least if the latter does occur, you won't be around to feel your shame.

Similar craft have been manufactured in the U.S., such as Honeywell's Micro Air Vehicle (MAV) — though the MAV achieves flight via fans that push the craft up, rather than reducing air pressure above so it can rise. The idea behind these craft is that a military base or unit in the field could use them to scout locations or aid in rescue missions. A flying saucer could float over an area that's been attacked, and feed images back to soldiers who want to find out if there are any survivors. Already, emergency responders in the U.S. have used devices like these for rescuing people in collapsed buildings.

According to The Register:

The Fenstar 50 will be the first GFS saucer to use an internal combustion engine. Previous craft have been electrically powered, and have suffered from very short endurance. The current [state of the art] electric saucer . . . can normally stay up for just two and a half minutes. The new Fenstar 50 is expected to manage up to an hour, carrying a payload of 5kg - a quarter of its all-up weight. GFS aims to keep the total weight under 20kg.

Yes, I want one please. And I want a space inside so my kittens can fly in it.

Brit Firm to Demo Serious Flying Robo-Saucer [The Register]

According to a UPI report on Space War:

The IRAM is . . . in essence . . . a flying IED. It consists of a canister — either a propane tank or cylinder — packed with explosives attached to a rocket tube (body) and powered by a 107mm rocket motor. Each IRAM carries more than 100 pounds of high explosive. In contrast, a conventional 107mm rocket carries only 3 pounds.

The device is placed on rocket rails, which can be angled for distance, and fired at its target by a timing device, military officers said.

The rails are placed on the back of a low-sided flatbed cargo truck, usually a Bongo, which is ever-present in Baghdad. The truck is parked and angled toward the target, and the devices (usually four or more in succession) are launched using delayed timers.

Aiming is directional, a sort of line-of-sight lob over the cab of the truck or over the side. Distance is about 300 to 500 meters, according to Maj. Geoff Greene, executive officer of the 1st (combined Arms) Battalion of the 68 Armor Regiment.

In a June incident, an IRAM accidentally went off in a civilian area, killing 16 and injuring 29 others. So far, no US military have been killed by IRAMs.

I said earlier the IRAM is a weapon of the future because it's looking like the terrorist model of warfare is going to be with us for a long time to come. That means you'll have organized state forces going up against people who are fighting with little formal training using whatever devices they can. It probably won't be long before we see guided IRAMs — just attach the whole thing to a remote-controlled plane that can carry the weight and you're set.

Airborne IED Gets Attention [Space War]

Once each year, the Office of Naval Research holds a conference where they explain what they're currently working on. This year, the ONR detailed several weapons systems that seem like they were lifted straight out of your favorite military sci-fi novel.

Solid state fiber lasers could be mounted in "pods" on aircraft, able to deliver 100 kW blasts. Free Electron Lasers will begin development in 2010, and will hopefully have the ability to take out incoming ordinance or even small attack (or suicide) boats. The lasers don't stop there - helicopters could be equipped with laser terrain finding gear to help them land in "brownout" conditions.

Lasers not sexy enough? How about directed microwave weapons? I've been dreaming of one of these for years, to take out the thumping audio systems of cars that drive past my house. The Navy would rather use them to fry the electronics in enemy equipment.

The ultimate naval weapon might be the hyper-velocity railgun. It could propel projectiles up to 230 miles with killer accuracy at speeds close to Mach 7. The Navy holds a world record for "highest electromagnetic muzzle energy launch of a projectile" using such a weapon. I have no idea what that means, but I know I wouldn't want to get hit by one. These megaguns aren't without their flaws, though. That kind of muzzle velocity tends to destroy the barrel of the gun, and each firing draws something like three million amps. Image by: U.S. Navy.

Navy Wants Lots of Lasers [Defense Tech]