Thursday, June 04, 2020
FRANKEN SCIENCE
The DARPA Model for Transformative Technologies: Perspectives on the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
Hardcover – December 5, 2019
The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has played a remarkable role in the creation new transformative technologies, revolutionizing defense with drones and precision-guided munitions, and transforming civilian life with portable GPS receivers, voice-recognition software, self-driving cars, unmanned aerial vehicles, and, most famously, the ARPANET and its successor, the Internet.
Other parts of the U.S. Government and some foreign governments have tried to apply the 'DARPA model' to help develop valuable new technologies. But how and why has DARPA succeeded? Which features of its operation and environment contribute to this success? And what lessons does its experience offer for other U.S. agencies and other governments that want to develop and demonstrate their own 'transformative technologies'?
This book is a remarkable collection of leading academic research on DARPA from a wide range of perspectives, combining to chart an important story from the Agency's founding in the wake of Sputnik, to the current attempts to adapt it to use by other federal agencies. Informative and insightful, this guide is essential reading for political and policy leaders, as well as researchers and students interested in understanding the success of this agency and the lessons it offers to others.
--Dr. Kent Hughes, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
AS PER USUAL THIS LINK GOES TO AMAZON KINDLE WHERE YOU CAN BUY THE E BOOK, CHEAPEST VERSION OF THIS BOOK, OR DOWNLOAD A FREE CHAPTER.
FRANKEN SCIENCE
Strategic Computing: DARPA and the Quest for Machine Intelligence, 1983-1993 Hardcover – Sept. 13 2002
The story of the U.S. Department of Defense's extraordinary effort, in the period from 1983 to 1993, to achieve machine intelligence.
This is the story of an extraordinary effort by the U.S. Department of Defense to hasten the advent of "machines that think." From 1983 to 1993, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) spent an extra $1 billion on computer research aimed at achieving artificial intelligence. The Strategic Computing Initiative (SCI) was conceived as an integrated plan to promote computer chip design and manufacture, computer architecture, and artificial intelligence software. What distinguished SCI from other large-scale technology programs was that it self-consciously set out to advance an entire research front. The SCI succeeded in fostering significant technological successes, even though it never achieved machine intelligence. The goal provided a powerful organizing principle for a suite of related research programs, but it did not solve the problem of coordinating these programs. In retrospect, it is hard to see how it could have.In Strategic Computing, Alex Roland and Philip Shiman uncover the roles played in the SCI by technology, individuals, and social and political forces. They explore DARPA culture, especially the information processing culture within the agency, and they evaluate the SCI's accomplishments and set them in the context of overall computer development during this period. Their book is an important contribution to our understanding of the complex sources of contemporary computing.
FRANKEN SCIENCE
The Department of Mad Scientists: How DARPA Is Remaking Our World, from the Internet to Artificial Limbs Paperback – November 2, 2010
https://tinyurl.com/yce4u7ef
America's greatest idea factory isn't Bell Labs, Silicon Valley, or MIT's Media Lab. It's the secretive, Pentagon-led agency known as DARPA. Founded by Eisenhower in response to Sputnik and the Soviet space program, DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) mixes military officers with sneaker-wearing scientists, seeking paradigm-shifting ideas in varied fields—from energy, robotics, and rockets to doctorless operating rooms, driverless cars, and planes that can fly halfway around the world in just a few hours.
Michael Belfiore was given unpre-cedented access to write this first-ever popular account of DARPA. The Department of Mad Scientists contains material that has barely been reported in the general media—in fact, only 2 percent of Americans know much of anything about the agency. But as this fascinating read demonstrates, DARPA isn't so much frightening as it is inspiring—it is our future.
Annie Jacobsen: Inside DARPA: The Pentagon's Brain
World Affairs
•Sep 30, 2015
The internet, GPS, voice recognition programs like Siri – many of the technologies that we use today were developed with national security in mind. These inventions and many others began as projects of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Defense Department’s secretive military research agency. For more than fifty years, DARPA has held to a singular and enduring mission: to make pivotal investments in breakthrough technologies for national security. The genesis of that mission and of DARPA itself dates to the Cold War and the launch of Sputnik in 1957, and a commitment by the United States that it would be the initiator and not the victim of strategic technological surprises. Working with innovators inside and outside of government, DARPA has repeatedly delivered on that mission, transforming revolutionary concepts and even seeming impossibilities into practical capabilities. The ultimate results have included not only game-changing military capabilities such as precision weapons and stealth technology, but also major innovations in modern civilian society. How do they do it? What makes this military organization such fertile ground for invention? What technologies with useful daily applications have failed to enter into civilian use? Can Silicon Valley learn from DARPA, or vice versa? Drawing on extensive interviews, declassified memos and inside sources, investigative journalist Annie Jacobsen will share insights into this top-secret organization. Speaker Annie Jacobsen is an Investigative Journalist and Author. The conversation is moderated by Andrew Becker, Reporter, The Center for Investigative Reporting.
https://tinyurl.com/ya6khrwg
A Pulitzer Prize Finalist and the definitive history of DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, from the author of the New York Times bestseller Area 51.
No one has ever written the history of the Defense Department's most secret, most powerful, and most controversial military science R&D agency. In the first-ever history about the organization, New York Times bestselling author Annie Jacobsen draws on inside sources, exclusive interviews, private documents, and declassified memos to paint a picture of DARPA, or "the Pentagon's brain," from its Cold War inception in 1958 to the present.
This is the book on DARPA -- a compelling narrative about this clandestine intersection of science and the American military and the often frightening results.
World Affairs
•Sep 30, 2015
The internet, GPS, voice recognition programs like Siri – many of the technologies that we use today were developed with national security in mind. These inventions and many others began as projects of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Defense Department’s secretive military research agency. For more than fifty years, DARPA has held to a singular and enduring mission: to make pivotal investments in breakthrough technologies for national security. The genesis of that mission and of DARPA itself dates to the Cold War and the launch of Sputnik in 1957, and a commitment by the United States that it would be the initiator and not the victim of strategic technological surprises. Working with innovators inside and outside of government, DARPA has repeatedly delivered on that mission, transforming revolutionary concepts and even seeming impossibilities into practical capabilities. The ultimate results have included not only game-changing military capabilities such as precision weapons and stealth technology, but also major innovations in modern civilian society. How do they do it? What makes this military organization such fertile ground for invention? What technologies with useful daily applications have failed to enter into civilian use? Can Silicon Valley learn from DARPA, or vice versa? Drawing on extensive interviews, declassified memos and inside sources, investigative journalist Annie Jacobsen will share insights into this top-secret organization. Speaker Annie Jacobsen is an Investigative Journalist and Author. The conversation is moderated by Andrew Becker, Reporter, The Center for Investigative Reporting.
https://tinyurl.com/ya6khrwg
A Pulitzer Prize Finalist and the definitive history of DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, from the author of the New York Times bestseller Area 51.
No one has ever written the history of the Defense Department's most secret, most powerful, and most controversial military science R&D agency. In the first-ever history about the organization, New York Times bestselling author Annie Jacobsen draws on inside sources, exclusive interviews, private documents, and declassified memos to paint a picture of DARPA, or "the Pentagon's brain," from its Cold War inception in 1958 to the present.
This is the book on DARPA -- a compelling narrative about this clandestine intersection of science and the American military and the often frightening results.
Review
Pulitzer Prize Finalist in History
One of The Washington Post's Notable Nonfiction Books of 2015
One of The Boston Globe's Best Books of 2015
One of Amazon's Top 100 Books of 2015
"A brilliantly researched account of a small but powerful secret government agency whose military research profoundly affects world affairs."―The Pulitzer Prize Committee
"Filled with the intrigue and high stakes of a spy novel, Jacobsen's history of DARPA is as much a fascinating testament to human ingenuity as it is a paean to endless industrial warfare and the bureaucracy of the military-industrial complex."―Kirkus Reviews
"A fascinating and unsettling portrait of the secretive U.S. government agency....Jacobsen walks a fine line in telling the story of the agency and its innovations without coming across as a cheerleader or a critic, or letting the narrative devolve into a salacious tell-all. Jacobsen's ability to objectively tell the story of DARPA, not to mention its murky past, is truly remarkable, making for a terrifically well-crafted treatise on the agency most Americans know next to nothing about."
―Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Jacobsen offers a definitive history of the clandestine agency.... She explores the implications of DARPA work on technology that will not be widely known to the public for generations but will certainly impact national security and concepts of war."―Vanessa Bush, Booklist (starred review)
"Jacobsen's account will serve as the model for histories of military research and development and is likely to lead to more works and articles about DARPA.... Engrossing, conversation-starting read..."―Library Journal
"Annie Jacobsen's considerable talents as an investigative journalist prove indispensable in uncovering the remarkable history of one of America's most powerful and clandestine military research agencies. And she is a great storyteller, making the tantalizing tale of The Pentagon's Brain -- from the depths of the Cold War to present day -- come alive on every page."―Gerald Posner, author of God's Bankers
"A fascinating and sometimes uneasy exploration of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency...."―Dina Temple-Raston, The Washington Post
"In this fascinating and terrifying account, Annie Jacobsen regales us with the stories behind the agency's 'consequential and sometimes Orwellian' innovations, including autonomous weapons systems--killer robots that could decide, without human intervention, who lives and who dies."―Bryan Schatz, Mother Jones
"Annie Jacobsen has a gift for unearthing secret, long-buried information."―Mary Ann Gwinn, Seattle Times
"An exciting read that asks an important question: what is the risk of allowing lethal technologies to be developed in secret?"―Ann Finkbeiner, Nature
One of The Washington Post's Notable Nonfiction Books of 2015
One of The Boston Globe's Best Books of 2015
One of Amazon's Top 100 Books of 2015
"A brilliantly researched account of a small but powerful secret government agency whose military research profoundly affects world affairs."―The Pulitzer Prize Committee
"Filled with the intrigue and high stakes of a spy novel, Jacobsen's history of DARPA is as much a fascinating testament to human ingenuity as it is a paean to endless industrial warfare and the bureaucracy of the military-industrial complex."―Kirkus Reviews
"A fascinating and unsettling portrait of the secretive U.S. government agency....Jacobsen walks a fine line in telling the story of the agency and its innovations without coming across as a cheerleader or a critic, or letting the narrative devolve into a salacious tell-all. Jacobsen's ability to objectively tell the story of DARPA, not to mention its murky past, is truly remarkable, making for a terrifically well-crafted treatise on the agency most Americans know next to nothing about."
―Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Jacobsen offers a definitive history of the clandestine agency.... She explores the implications of DARPA work on technology that will not be widely known to the public for generations but will certainly impact national security and concepts of war."―Vanessa Bush, Booklist (starred review)
"Jacobsen's account will serve as the model for histories of military research and development and is likely to lead to more works and articles about DARPA.... Engrossing, conversation-starting read..."―Library Journal
"Annie Jacobsen's considerable talents as an investigative journalist prove indispensable in uncovering the remarkable history of one of America's most powerful and clandestine military research agencies. And she is a great storyteller, making the tantalizing tale of The Pentagon's Brain -- from the depths of the Cold War to present day -- come alive on every page."―Gerald Posner, author of God's Bankers
"A fascinating and sometimes uneasy exploration of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency...."―Dina Temple-Raston, The Washington Post
"In this fascinating and terrifying account, Annie Jacobsen regales us with the stories behind the agency's 'consequential and sometimes Orwellian' innovations, including autonomous weapons systems--killer robots that could decide, without human intervention, who lives and who dies."―Bryan Schatz, Mother Jones
"Annie Jacobsen has a gift for unearthing secret, long-buried information."―Mary Ann Gwinn, Seattle Times
"An exciting read that asks an important question: what is the risk of allowing lethal technologies to be developed in secret?"―Ann Finkbeiner, Nature
About the Author
Annie Jacobsen is the author of the New York Times bestsellers Area 51 and Operation Paperclip and the Pulitzer Prize finalist The Pentagon's Brain. She was a contributing editor at the Los Angeles Times Magazine. A graduate of Princeton University, she lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two sons
The Imagineers of War: The Untold Story of DARPA, the Pentagon Agency That Changed the World Hardcover – March 14 2017
Product description
Review
“Excellent… A warning worth heeding… Weinberger…has cracked much of the secrecy that surrounds DARPA. [She] is especially deft in tracing how drones went from their early days in spotting and tracking Viet Cong fighters in the jungle to today, where they are part of the foundation of modern warfare.”
—Ray Locker, USA Today
“Groundbreaking.... Provides a glimpse into the history of war itself through the lens of an agency that bills itself as trying to ‘prevent and create surprise.’.... The best kind of airport thriller.”
—The New Scientist
"Deeply researched and briskly paced."
—Fred Kaplan, the New York Times Book Review
"[A] defining behind-the-scenes look at the confluence of defense politics and technological prowess. Exploring silly schemes as well as sensible ideas, distinguished military science and technology expert Weinberger profiles the crusaders who thought outside the box in service to their country and their own limitless creativity."
—Carol Haggas, Booklist
"Her account is critical but not mocking…a well-researched contribution to the history of U.S. military technology."
—Lawrence D. Freedman, Foreign Affairs
"They are the wizards of war, the faceless scientists who fight the battles of the future in lab coats instead of body armor, turning insects into remote control cyborgs and designing warships without crews. In her new book, Sharon Weinberger has placed one of the government’s most secret laboratories, DARPA, under an electron microscope and discovered a world far beyond anyone’s imagination."
—James Bamford, bestselling author of The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA, from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America.
"From the Internet of today to the robots of tomorrow, DARPA has shaped not just the technology of war, but our day to day lives. Sharon Weinberger's The Imagineers of War lays out its untold history in an easy and informative read, along the way, reshaping the way you will look at events that range from the Vietnam War to the War on Terror."
—P.W. Singer, author of Ghost Fleet and Wired for War
"[A] fascinating and absorbing history… Weinberger’s account, based on extensive and meticulous research, reveals surprising twists in the recent history of the age-old entanglement between knowledge and power."
—David Kaiser, Nature Research
"A deep organizational history rather than a technological chronicle. [Weinberger] scours reams of archival material and interviews former officials…revealing a highly secretive organization with a fittingly mixed legacy."
—Publishers Weekly
—Ray Locker, USA Today
“Groundbreaking.... Provides a glimpse into the history of war itself through the lens of an agency that bills itself as trying to ‘prevent and create surprise.’.... The best kind of airport thriller.”
—The New Scientist
"Deeply researched and briskly paced."
—Fred Kaplan, the New York Times Book Review
"[A] defining behind-the-scenes look at the confluence of defense politics and technological prowess. Exploring silly schemes as well as sensible ideas, distinguished military science and technology expert Weinberger profiles the crusaders who thought outside the box in service to their country and their own limitless creativity."
—Carol Haggas, Booklist
"Her account is critical but not mocking…a well-researched contribution to the history of U.S. military technology."
—Lawrence D. Freedman, Foreign Affairs
"They are the wizards of war, the faceless scientists who fight the battles of the future in lab coats instead of body armor, turning insects into remote control cyborgs and designing warships without crews. In her new book, Sharon Weinberger has placed one of the government’s most secret laboratories, DARPA, under an electron microscope and discovered a world far beyond anyone’s imagination."
—James Bamford, bestselling author of The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA, from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America.
"From the Internet of today to the robots of tomorrow, DARPA has shaped not just the technology of war, but our day to day lives. Sharon Weinberger's The Imagineers of War lays out its untold history in an easy and informative read, along the way, reshaping the way you will look at events that range from the Vietnam War to the War on Terror."
—P.W. Singer, author of Ghost Fleet and Wired for War
"[A] fascinating and absorbing history… Weinberger’s account, based on extensive and meticulous research, reveals surprising twists in the recent history of the age-old entanglement between knowledge and power."
—David Kaiser, Nature Research
"A deep organizational history rather than a technological chronicle. [Weinberger] scours reams of archival material and interviews former officials…revealing a highly secretive organization with a fittingly mixed legacy."
—Publishers Weekly
About the Author
SHARON WEINBERGER is Executive Editor at Foreign Policy and the author of Imaginary Weapons: A Journey Through the Pentagon's Scientific Underworld. She is currently a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University and a Global Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. She has also held fellowships at MIT's Knight Science Journalism program, the International Reporting Program at Johns Hopkins Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, and Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. She has written on military science and technology for Nature, BBC, Discover, Slate, Wired, and The Washington Post, among others.
FRANKEN SCIENCE
The Imagineers of War: The Untold Story of DARPA, the Pentagon Agency That Changed the World
Paperback – February 20, 2018
The definitive history of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon agency that has quietly shaped war and technology for nearly sixty years.
Founded in 1958 in response to the launch of Sputnik, the agency’s original mission was to create “the unimagined weapons of the future.” Over the decades, DARPA has been responsible for countless inventions and technologies that extend well beyond military technology. Sharon Weinberger gives us a riveting account of DARPA’s successes and failures, its remarkable innovations, and its wild-eyed schemes. We see how the threat of nuclear Armageddon sparked investment in computer networking, leading to the Internet, as well as to a proposal to power a missile-destroying particle beam by draining the Great Lakes. We learn how DARPA was responsible during the Vietnam War for both Agent Orange and the development of the world’s first armed drones, and how after 9/11 the agency sparked a national controversy over surveillance with its data-mining research. And we see how DARPA’s success with self-driving cars was followed by disappointing contributions to the Afghanistan and Iraq wars.
Weinberger has interviewed more than one hundred former Pentagon officials and scientists involved in DARPA’s projects—many of whom have never spoken publicly about their work with the agency—and pored over countless declassified records from archives around the country, documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, and exclusive materials provided by sources. The Imagineers of War is a compelling and groundbreaking history in which science, technology, and politics collide.
ANNIE JACOBSEN ON THE HISTORY OF AREA 51
https://tinyurl.com/y9jultd7
It is the most famous military installation in the world. And it doesn't exist. Located a mere seventy-five miles outside of Las Vegas in Nevada's desert, the base has never been acknowledged by the U.S. government-but Area 51 has captivated imaginations for decades.
Myths and hypotheses about Area 51 have long abounded, thanks to the intense secrecy enveloping it. Some claim it is home to aliens, underground tunnel systems, and nuclear facilities. Others believe that the lunar landing itself was filmed there. The prevalence of these rumors stems from the fact that no credible insider has ever divulged the truth about his time inside the base. Until now.
Annie Jacobsen had exclusive access to nineteen men who served the base proudly and secretly for decades and are now aged 75-92, and unprecedented access to fifty-five additional military and intelligence personnel, scientists, pilots, and engineers linked to the secret base, thirty-two of whom lived and worked there for extended periods. In Area 51, Jacobsen shows us what has really gone on in the Nevada desert, from testing nuclear weapons to building super-secret, supersonic jets to pursuing the War on Terror.
This is the first book based on interviews with eye witnesses to Area 51 history, which makes it the seminal work on the subject. Filled with formerly classified information that has never been accurately decoded for the public, Area 51 weaves the mysterious activities of the top-secret base into a gripping narrative, showing that facts are often more fantastic than fiction, especially when the distinction is almost impossible to make.
Journalist Annie Jacobsen: ESP and the U.S. Government
•Apr 6, 2017
Commonwealth Club
Annie Jacobsen, Former Contributing Editor, Los Angeles Times Magazine; Author, Phenomena: The Secret History of the U.S. Government’s Investigations into Extrasensory Perception and Psychokinesis; Twitter @AnnieJacobsen
Barry Eisler, Novelist, Blogger, Former CIA Operative, Twitter @barryeisler—Moderator
Annie Jacobsen is an investigative journalist and best-selling author who writes about war, weapons, U.S. national security and government secrecy. Her Area 51 was an international best seller and The Pentagon’s Brain was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Now, she has written what she says is the definitive history of the military's decades-long investigation into mental powers and phenomena. Jacobsen says that for more than 40 years, the U.S. government has researched extrasensory perception, using it in attempts to locate hostages, fugitives, secret bases and downed fighter jets; to divine other nations' secrets; and even to predict future threats to national security. The agencies involved include the CIA, DIA, NSA, DEA, Navy, Air Force, Army and even the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Now, for the first time, Jacobsen tells the story of these radical, controversial programs, using never-before-seen declassified documents as well as exclusive interviews with more than 50 former CIA and Defense Department scientists, analysts and program managers, as well as the government psychics themselves. Come hear this unusual program that may challenge your own perceptions of reality.
•Apr 6, 2017
Commonwealth Club
Annie Jacobsen, Former Contributing Editor, Los Angeles Times Magazine; Author, Phenomena: The Secret History of the U.S. Government’s Investigations into Extrasensory Perception and Psychokinesis; Twitter @AnnieJacobsen
Barry Eisler, Novelist, Blogger, Former CIA Operative, Twitter @barryeisler—Moderator
Annie Jacobsen is an investigative journalist and best-selling author who writes about war, weapons, U.S. national security and government secrecy. Her Area 51 was an international best seller and The Pentagon’s Brain was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Now, she has written what she says is the definitive history of the military's decades-long investigation into mental powers and phenomena. Jacobsen says that for more than 40 years, the U.S. government has researched extrasensory perception, using it in attempts to locate hostages, fugitives, secret bases and downed fighter jets; to divine other nations' secrets; and even to predict future threats to national security. The agencies involved include the CIA, DIA, NSA, DEA, Navy, Air Force, Army and even the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Now, for the first time, Jacobsen tells the story of these radical, controversial programs, using never-before-seen declassified documents as well as exclusive interviews with more than 50 former CIA and Defense Department scientists, analysts and program managers, as well as the government psychics themselves. Come hear this unusual program that may challenge your own perceptions of reality.
Sugar: The Bitter Truth
Jul 30, 2009
University of California Television (UCTV)
(1:06 - Start of Presentation) Robert H. Lustig, MD, UCSF Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology, explores the damage caused by sugary foods. He argues that fructose (too much) and fiber (not enough) appear to be cornerstones of the obesity epidemic through their effects on insulin. Recorded on 05/26/2009. [7/2009] [Show ID: 16717]
Mini Medical School for the Public
(https://www.uctv.tv/minimed)
Explore More Health & Medicine on UCTV
(https://www.uctv.tv/health)
UCTV features the latest in health and medicine from University of California medical schools. Find the information you need on cancer, transplantation, obesity, disease and much more.
UCTV is the broadcast and online media platform of the University of California, featuring programming from its ten campuses, three national labs and affiliated research institutions. UCTV explores a broad spectrum of subjects for a general audience, including science, health and medicine, public affairs, humanities, arts and music, business, education, and agriculture. Launched in January 2000, UCTV embraces the core missions of the University of California -- teaching, research, and public service – by providing quality, in-depth television far beyond the campus borders to inquisitive viewers around the world.
(https://www.uctv.tv)
Food and Diaspora, Professor Sidney Mintz, SOAS University of London
•Jun 27, 2017
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)