The US Military Is Building Its Own Metaverse
...The key technologies needed for the metaverse—augmented and virtual reality, headmounted displays, 3D simulations and virtual environments built by artificial intelligence—are already found in the defense world. ... And there’s a good chance that the underlying tech could take off, even if it stutters in the civilian realm. ...
A mix of augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and video game graphics, for instance, have enabled fighter pilots to practice dogfighting against virtual opponents, including Chinese and Russian warplanes, while pulling several Gs. Red 6, the company that’s developing the technology, says this delivers a far more realistic test of a pilot’s abilities than a conventional flight simulator. “We can fly against whatever threat we want,” says Daniel Robinson, founder and CEO of Red 6. “And that threat could be controlled either by an individual remotely or by artificial intelligence.” ...
Metaverse-related ideas are already part of some of the latest military systems. The high-tech helmet for the new F-35 fighter jet, for instance, includes an augmented reality display that shows telemetry data and target information on top of video footage from around the aircraft. ...
In 2014, the Office of Naval Research and the Institute for Creative Technologies at the University of Southern California developed Project BlueShark, a system that allowed sailors to drive vessels and collaborate in a virtual environment. ...
“The promise is integrating these technologies,” says Caitlin Dohrman, general manager of the defense division of Improbable, a company that develops virtual world technologies, has created sprawling virtual battlefields featuring over 10,000 individually controlled characters for the UK’s military wargames, and also works with the US Department of Defense (DOD). ...
In 2017, Luckey cofounded the defense company Anduril. He says that despite all the recent metaverse hype, there is big defense potential, partly because military training is so important and costly. But he says the technology does not have to be hyper-realistic to be useful, and he wants Anduril to focus on only using the technology where necessary. ...
“When you are out there shooting and being shot at, the last thing you want to worry about is another piece of equipment,” he says. And technology does not need to be as expansive as a metaverse to be useful. ...
See the full story here: https://www.wired.com/story/military-metaverse/
