Exploring Information Superiority

Assessing how technology contributes to information superiority and decision dominance a major challenge, in part because it demands quantitative measures for what are usually considered qualitative concepts. The authors have developed a mathematical framework to aid these efforts. Additional work, such as data fitting, experimentation, linking decisions and actions, historical analysis, and gaming will further advance knowledge in this area.

This book provides readers with a timely snapshot of ergonomics research and methods applied to the design, development and evaluation, of products, systems and services. It gathers theoretical contributions, case studies and reports on technical interventions focusing on a better understanding of human machine interaction, and user experience for improving product design. The book covers a wide range of established and emerging topics in user-centered design, relating to design for special populations, design education, workplace assessment and design, anthropometry, ergonomics of buildings and urban design, sustainable design, as well as visual ergonomics and interdisciplinary research and practices, among others. Based on the AHFE 2021 International Conference on Ergonomics in Design, held virtually on 25–29 July, 2021, from USA, the book offers a thought-provoking guide for both researchers and practitioners in human-centered design and related fields.

Achieving decision superiority hinges on information superiority. Wielhouwer introduces the concept of operational net assessment, as well as its process and product, identifying them as enablers of effects-based planning and effects-based operations. The synergy of these tools provides joint force commanders extensive information in advance of a crisis, leading to actionable knowledge and decision superiority that facilitate the effective application of diplomatic, economic, informational, and military power. Illustrations.

This book presents a range of qualitative and quantitative analyses in areas such as cybersecurity, sustainability, multivariate analysis, customer satisfaction, parametric programming, software reliability growth modeling, and blockchain technology, to name but a few. It also highlights integrated methods and practices in the areas of machine learning and genetic algorithms. After discussing applications in supply chains and logistics, cloud computing, six sigma, production management, big data analysis, satellite imaging, game theory, biometric systems, quality, and system performance, the book examines the latest developments and breakthroughs in the field of science and technology, and provides novel problem-solving methods. The themes discussed in the book link contributions by researchers and practitioners from different branches of engineering and management, and hailing from around the globe. These contributions provide scholars with a platform to derive maximum utility in the area of analytics by subscribing to the idea of managing business through system sciences, operations, and management. Managers and decision-makers can learn a great deal from the respective chapters, which will help them devise their own business strategies and find real-world solutions to complex industrial problems.

In a world of accelerating unending change, perpetual surveillance, and increasing connectivity, conflict has become ever more complex. Wars are no longer limited to the traditional military conflict domains—land, sea, air; even space and cyber space. The new battlefield will be the cognitive domain and the new conflict a larger contest for power; a contest for cognitive superiority. Written by experts in military operations research and neuropsychology, this book introduces the concept of cognitive superiority and provides the keys to succeeding within a complex matrix where the only rules are the laws of physics, access to information, and the boundaries of cognition. The book describes the adversarial environment and how it interacts with the ongoing, accelerating change that we are experiencing, irrespective of adversaries. It talks about the ascendant power of information access, pervasive surveillance, personalized persuasion, and emerging new forms of cognition. It profiles salient technologies and science, including persuasion science, artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML), surveillance technologies, complex adaptive systems, network science, directed human modification, and biosecurity. Readers will learn about human and machine cognition, what makes it tick, and why and how we and our technologies are vulnerable. Following in the tradition of Sun-Tsu and von Clausewitz, this book writes a new chapter in the study of warfare and strategy. It is written for those who lead, aspire to leadership, and those who teach or persuade, especially in the fields of political science, military science, computer science, and business.

The capacity and means by which the American Armed Forces defend their nation are entering a paradigm-breaking transition period. Previous transitions have been driven by the technologies of weapons and their platforms. This is not so in the 21st century. Taking the information revolution as a starting point, Battle-Wise argues that only by strengthening the relationship between information technology and brain matter will the U.S. military enhance its ability to outsmart and outfight future adversaries. Our aim is to understand whether and how advantages in thinking and decisionmaking under operational conditions can affect outcomes victories or defeats especially in networked warfare. It is important to identify as precisely as possible the mental abilities, such as anticipation and rapid adaptation, that are of greatest utility in networked operations and thus in strategic competition so that these abilities can be emphasized in the ways that military personnel are recruited, taught, developed, and organized. The role of the mind in networked warfare is still unknown. This book is meant to raise ideas, issues, and possibilities, as well as at the risk of seeming presumptuous a potential framework.

Provides answers to some of the fundamental questions regarding network-centric warfare (NCW) as an emerging theory of war in the Information Age. Describes how the tenets and principles of NCW are providing the foundation for developing new warfighting concepts, organizations, and processes that will allow our forces to maintain a competitive advantage over potential adversaries, now and in the future. Provides an overview of the ongoing implementation of NCW in the Department of Defense (DoD).