Through the ages, Man has searched for a crystal ball that can tell the future, and now super salesmen/researchers at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) are telling the Pentagon they're working on a remarkable suite of software that can do just that. "Deep Green" uses a variety of approaches to first gather information about what's currently happening on a battlefield, and then extrapolates the likelihood of outcomes if various actions are taken.

In a scenario that sounds like science fiction, here's how the software is supposed to work: After listening to a military planner's opinions about the current situation, and mixing that with some of his drawings, the "sketch to plan" part of the software gathers all the information about what the commanding officer would like to do. Then the "sketch to decide" module displays storyboards showing what will probably happen if each plan is carried out. The quick punch part of the software is "Blitzkrieg," which rapidly deduces what might be the best course of action, and then there's "Crystal Ball," which computes likely outcomes from thousands of possibilities, presenting the best ones to the field generals.

This sounds like a wildly optimistic and bold approach to harnessing computer power to solve military problems. Perhaps the most reassuring aspect of this project for those DARPA personnel who are in the three-year process of developing the software is the impossibility of proving whether their "crystal ball" picked the best alternative among all of the available choices. Even so, as long as "Deep Green" is more accurate than flipping a coin, it just might be able to give U.S. military commanders an edge over their foes. — Charlie White

Via Danger Room