Ayn Rand and the Posthuman is a study of the American novelist’s relationship with twenty-first-century ideas about technology. Rand wrote science fiction that has inspired Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, politicians, and economists. Ben Murnane demonstrates Rand’s connection to, and impact on, those with a “posthuman” vision, in which human and machine merge. The text examines the philosophical intersections between Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism and posthumanism, and Rand’s influence on transhumanism, a major branch of posthumanist thought. The book further investigates Rand’s presence and portrayal in various examples of posthumanist science fiction, including Gene Roddenberry’s Andromeda, popular videogame BioShock, and Zoltan Istvan’s novel The Transhumanist Wager. Considering Rand’s influence from a cultural, political, technological, and economic perspective, this study throws light on an under-documented but highly significant aspect of Rand’s legacy.
Since 9/11, Russia, China, and Iran have successfully exploited or stretched U.S. thresholds for high-order war in order to further their strategic ends and, in the process, undermine U.S. interests. Each of these countries has made expert use of some combination of measures short of war to enact its strategies. This report describes those measures and how these nation-states use them and explains why U.S. notions of thresholds might be outdated.
The unpredictable counterinsurgency environment challenges centralized, quantitative campaign assessment. A comprehensive examination of the centralized, quantitative approach to assessment, as described in the literature and doctrine and applied in two primary case studies (Vietnam and Afghanistan), reveals weaknesses and gaps and proposes an alternative process: contextual assessment.
RAND studied 89 modern insurgency cases to test conventional understanding about how insurgencies end. Findings relevant to policymakers and analysts include that modern insurgencies last about ten years; withdrawal of state support cripples insurgencies; civil defense forces are useful for both sides; pseudodemocracies fare poorly against insurgents; and governments win more often in the long run.
Efficient movement of freight within the United States and across its borders is a critical enabler of future U.S. economic growth. The authors provide an overview of the freight-transportation system and the problems it faces, concluding with a discussion of key system-modernization issues, including increasing capacity, making the system less vulnerable to disruption, addressing environmental concerns, and building support for funding.
With descriptions and strategy tips for 50 wild beer games, plus outrageous essays, cartoons, lists, and so on, the book has become the "Preppy Handbook" for beer drinkers.
Ayn Rand and the Posthuman is a study of the American novelist’s relationship with twenty-first-century ideas about technology. Rand wrote science fiction that has inspired Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, politicians, and economists. Ben Murnane demonstrates Rand’s connection to, and impact on, those with a “posthuman” vision, in which human and machine merge. The text examines the philosophical intersections between Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism and posthumanism, and Rand’s influence on transhumanism, a major branch of posthumanist thought. The book further investigates Rand’s presence and portrayal in various examples of posthumanist science fiction, including Gene Roddenberry’s Andromeda, popular videogame BioShock, and Zoltan Istvan’s novel The Transhumanist Wager. Considering Rand’s influence from a cultural, political, technological, and economic perspective, this study throws light on an under-documented but highly significant aspect of Rand’s legacy.
Ending the U.S. war in Iraq required redeploying 100,000 military and civilian personnel; handing off responsibility for 431 activities to the Iraqi government, U.S. embassy, USCENTCOM, or other U.S. government entities; and moving or transferring ownership of over a million pieces of property in accordance with U.S. and Iraqi laws, national policy, and DoD requirements. This book examines the planning and execution of this transition.
This report focuses on identifying ways to improve coordination of international and national entities managing the Syrian refugee response in urban areas in Jordan and Lebanon, particularly in the legal, employment, shelter, water and sanitation, health, and education sectors. This report makes several contributions to the existing literature on this topic. First, it assesses the management model of a complex emergency response in urban areas in middle-income countries; most existing literature about humanitarian responses focuses on camps in weak states. Second, it brings together views of a broad spectrum of stakeholders to provide a comprehensive, multidimensional analysis of management of the Syrian refugee crisis in Jordan and Lebanon in particular. Third, this study presents a new framework for planning, evaluating, and managing refugee crises in urban settings, both in the Syrian refugee crisis as well as other such situations going forward. Fourth, it provides concrete recommendations for how to better support the needs of Syrian urban refugees in Jordan and Lebanon and for how to rethink refugee-assistance coordination around the world for improved effectiveness in the future. This study drew on multiple methods: a literature review; interviews in Jordan and Lebanon with officials from donor countries, UN agencies, host governments, and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs); telephone interviews with international experts; and focus groups with refugees"--Back cover.
The Islamic State has lost substantial amounts of territory but continues to conduct and inspire attacks around the world. This report assesses the threat the Islamic State poses to the United States and examines strategies to counter the group and prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State or other Salafi-jihadist groups.
Greater use of information and communications technologies (ICTs) marks a U.S. transition toward a "digital society" that may profoundly affect electricity supply, demand, and delivery. RAND developed four 2001-2021 scenarios of ICT evolution and assessed their implications for U.S. electricity requirements. Even large deployment of ICTs will only modestly increase U.S. electricity use over the next two decades. The more pressing concern will be how to meet the increased need for higher-quality and more-reliable power that accompanies ICT use.
This report discusses an attempt to identify the major problems with the existing Army 21 Interim Operational Concept and suggests an alternative framework for the Army's study of future warfighting concepts. With the current Army doctrine--Airland Battle--as the baseline, the plausible variations in implementation should be made over the next 10 to 15 years. The objective would be to project an estimate of Army needs and preferences. A long-term exploration effort would extend 30 to 40 years, where projections are necessarily highly speculative. Essentially deductive, this effort would consider a range of visions and would highlight generic developments. The purpose would be to stimulate conceptual thinking by contrasting different concepts, profiting from comparisons and choices between and among them. Keywords: Army operations; Army planning; Military doctrine.
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has presented a severe threat to state election plans in 2020 for primaries and for the general election. To conduct an election during the COVID-19 pandemic, states need registration and voting options that minimize direct personal contact and that reduce crowds and common access to high-touch surfaces. Another way to think about preparedness for conducting elections during a pandemic is to consider the flexibility that state election processes afford in terms of where, when, and how voters can get registered and cast votes. Particularly valuable to flexibility in the pandemic context are options that allow for the registration and voting processes to happen remotely or in ways that reduce person-to-person contact. In this report, the authors summarize state election laws on early voting, remote voting, and voter registration and discuss the potential implications of these laws for the execution of the November 2020 general election under conditions brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. This report is part of RAND's Countering Truth Decay initiative, which is focused on restoring the role of facts, data, and analysis in U.S. political and civil discourse and the policymaking process.
Presents basic Internet concepts and language and hands-on activies to teach operating system functions, file maintenance, how to use the browser, download software, use e-mail and newsgroups, conduct services.
Freedom of movement (FoM) is the actual or perceived degree to which individuals or groups can move from place to place within a given environment or into and out of that environment. Focusing specifically on Afghanistan, this examination considers actual and perceived FoM for a range of groups and profiles the factors that influence them and affect data reporting in potentially misleading ways.
What drives some governments to persevere in war at any price while others choose to stop fighting? It is often less-tangible political and economic variables, rather than raw military power, that ultimately determine national will to fight. In this analysis, the authors explore how these variables strengthen or weaken a government's determination to conduct sustained military operations, even when the expectation of success decreases or the need for significant political, economic, and military sacrifices increases. This report is part of a broader RAND Arroyo Center effort to help U.S. leaders better understand and influence will to fight at both the national level and the tactical and operational levels. It presents findings and recommendations based on a wide-ranging literature review, a series of interviews, 15 case studies (including deep dives into conflicts involving the Korean Peninsula and Russia), and reviews of relevant modeling and war-gaming. The authors propose an exploratory model of 15 variables that can be tailored and applied to a wide set of conflict scenarios and drive a much-needed dialogue among analysts conducting threat assessments, contingency plans, war games, and other efforts that require an evaluation of how future conflicts might unfold. The recommendations should provide insights into how leaders can influence will to fight in both allies and adversaries."--Publisher's description.
This report examines the use of the Commander's Emergency Response Program (CERP) in Afghanistan. It explores the effectiveness of CERP in supporting tactical operations in Afghanistan during the counterinsurgency-focused 2010-2013 time frame using both qualitative and quantitative methods and describes CERP's origins, history, and existing research on the effectiveness of CERP in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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