So directed energy weapons, hence why Rolls Royce is developing a new engine that can generate the electrical power... and the aircraft will read the pilots mind!

 

 

There's something that concerns me though. If the pilots are male, and its reading minds, and given what most males think about rather a lot... 🙄 could that be an issue? Me thinks hefty filtering will be required. 😆

What can a directed energy weapon do that a missile cannot? Travel a hell of a lot faster to the target for one thing...

Go unmanned: Get rid of the squishy meatbag G-limiter in the cockpit. Better still go full autonomous AI. See her off, go and get a nice cup of tea and wait for her to return.  Get angry if the enemy have so much as scratched her paintwork.

Martin, on the other hand, if the pilots were female and the planes could read minds, then for that certain window of time in each month, the enemy would absolutely, positively be annihilated. There would be an incredibly short, and decisive battle rather than a war.. 

3 minutes ago, HighBypass said:

 

Martin, on the other hand, if the pilots were female and the planes could read minds, then for that certain window of time in each month, the enemy would absolutely, positively be annihilated. There would be an incredibly short, and decisive battle rather than a war.. 

Hmmm, Since when is screaming and throwing a half gallon of vanilla ice cream on the floor considered a weapon?  Hint:  there was no chocolate in the ice cream! 🍨

43 minutes ago, HighBypass said:

What can a directed energy weapon do that a missile cannot? Travel a hell of a lot faster to the target for one thing...

 

 

Yep. 186,000 miles per second. Dead straight line. No bullet drop. No leading the target. Fire in any direction. A nasty adversary gets on your six and he's going to get a toasty surprise and quite a sun burn.

47 minutes ago, HighBypass said:

 

Martin, on the other hand, if the pilots were female and the planes could read minds, then for that certain window of time in each month, the enemy would absolutely, positively be annihilated. There would be an incredibly short, and decisive battle rather than a war.. 

 

😆 

Just as the systems onboard would be confused by what we boys absolutely know we would be thinking about, the systems in the ladies jets would be flooded by all manner of desighner handbags at extortionate prices and highly expensive, totally ineffective anti-wrinkle products.

 

See... I was talking from a purely biologically-induced standpoint, Martin. Now you've gone down that other, particularly unwise IMHO, rabbit hole...  

24 minutes ago, martin-w said:

 

Yep. 186,000 miles per second. Dead straight line. No bullet drop. No leading the target. Fire in any direction.

That gives it a couple of hundred miles of range with the platform exposed at maximum altitude, and this is assuming the target can be detected through clouds, smog, inversion layers etc, and that the targeting system can correct for atmospheric effects and indeed what would presumably be in some cases, relatively easy countermeasures. Sometimes only being able to shoot line of sight is not the best thing; a missile might be slower, but it can engage stuff over the horizon.

Didn't I recently read an article describing a test where AI consistently beat human fighter pilots in a computer simulation? I do admit to skepticism, however, since one of the greatest pilots ever said, "good against remotes is one thing; good against the living is something else."

15 hours ago, Chock said:

That gives it a couple of hundred miles of range with the platform exposed at maximum altitude, and this is assuming the target can be detected through clouds, smog, inversion layers etc, and that the targeting system can correct for atmospheric effects and indeed what would presumably be in some cases, relatively easy countermeasures. Sometimes only being able to shoot line of sight is not the best thing; a missile might be slower, but it can engage stuff over the horizon.

 

Couple of hundred miles seems a good range to me. Clouds etc are an issue for directed energy weapons. Not sure what the easy countermeasures are you mention. They wouldn't be planning directed energy weapons if it wasn't worth the huge investment, new engines, etc. 🙂 

6 minutes ago, Tim_Capps said:

Didn't I recently read an article describing a test where AI consistently beat human fighter pilots in a computer simulation? I do admit to skepticism, however, since one of the greatest pilots ever said, "good against remotes is one thing; good against the living is something else."

 

Yeah, that wasn't quite what it seemed. CJ Lemoine evaluated it on his channel. The human pilot was put at a considerable disadvantage by the rules of engagement. It was also done on a basic sim, not in real life. It was pointed out that the human pilot fought like he'd never been in a basic sim. It looked more like a DCS fight which the human pilot wasn't used to. The AI also had total situation awareness given to it. VR helmets as well that the human wasn't used to. 

 

 

 

Edited December 2, 20205 yr by martin-w