Documents / Official release
This Defense Intelligence Reference Document, dated 1 November 2010 and numbered DIA-08-1011-002, was prepared by the Defense Intelligence Agency's Defense Warning Office. It is one of a series of advanced technology reports produced under the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications program. It draws mainly on the book Frontiers of Propulsion Science and speculates about breakthroughs such as control of gravity and inertia and faster-than-light travel. It then proposes a provisional cockpit design with six-degree-of-freedom controls, virtual displays and no windows.
From the source:Release of 2026-09-18 Incident: 11/1/10, Las Vegas, Nevada. Released with redactions. This document is a Defense Intelligence Reference Document (DIRD), a technical reference format used by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) to capture baseline knowledge on a specific topic for later analytic use. DIRDs are best understood as reference and synthesis products rather than as original research. It is one of 38 DIRDs produced under the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications Program (AAWSAP) between 2009 and 2011. Because AAWSAP’s scope permitted a broad range of supporting topics, not every DIRD in the series directly concerns aerospace systems or future threat assessment. The following summary reflects the DIRD’s scope and framing at the time of writing and should not be read as implying current validation of the concepts discussed. This DIRD examines how cockpit design might change if future aerospace vehicles were ever to achieve major propulsion breakthroughs such as control over gravity and inertia, “propellantless” flight, or faster-than-light travel. The report does not describe an existing or emerging vehicle class. Instead, it asks what such hypothetical capabilities would mean for piloting, displays, controls, and human factors, and it argues that the biggest design challenges would come from full six-degree-of-freedom motion, operation across multiple flight regimes from near-surface flight to orbit and deep space, and the possible separation between the craft’s actual motion and the crew’s internal physical sensations. It combines those assumptions with established human-machine-interface principles and with maturing inputs such as gesture, voice, and brain-machine control to outline a provisional cockpit centered on intuitive displays, stress-tolerant physical controls, and a virtual surround display.
UNCLASSIFIED/ ,'FOR OFFI@IAL WSE QptLY Dwell and Reaction Time It takes about 0.4 to 0.6 seconds of dwell time at a particular display to extract the necessary quantitative information and at least 0.125 to 0.2 seconds for a qualitative recheck to reaffirm the reading has not significantly changed . In addition, the pilot needs another 0.125 to 0.2 seconds to act on that information. 28 Taken together, this creates a total response time of 0. 7 to 1.0 seconds between first looking at a display and commanding the appropriate response. As an aside, displays whose update rates exceed this dwell time cannot be accurately read. This means that displays shou ld be slowed down to the rate at which humans can absorb their information, rough ly a half-second. Tunnel Vision While under stress, humans t end to narrow their visual attention, often fixating on a single central display or task : the greater the stress, the greater the narrowing . Humans are oblivious to this effect as it is happening. (As an aside, hypoxia - breathing insufficient levels of oxygen-induces the same effect and can be used to simulate this cond ition during train ing.) Periphera l vision is ignored, although some evidence suggests that spatial peripheral cues are subconsciously retained. This tunnel vision tendency cannot be prevented, but can be accommodated by providing the most critical information on the central display in a natural symbolic format. 29 Forgetful Visual Scanning Humans tend to lose track of when they last looked at a particular area of information, sometimes forgetting to recheck parameters when needed. 30 This is where automated checklists can help, 31 as well as vehicle management systems that process the vehicle's situation and then recommend the best corrective measures. Limiting Options Humans tend to be able to retain only about 3 to 10 different items in short-term memory. Some studies focus on seven items as the optimum. Thus, it is recommended in quick-selection menus, or when designing hierarchical categorizations, to have no more than four to seven items per level. For groupings of information that are not needed during critical moments, these constraints can be relaxed, but with the added consequence of requiring significantly more browsing time. Adaptive Display Errors In computer displays having mu ltiple layered windows, or where the display changes in different situations, it is common that a user will lose track of how their current display image relates to the whole system. 32 Th is problem is called "getting lost" or referred to as a "keyhole" error. To prevent this error, it is best to simultaneously display some schematic indicator of where the user is in the system. Th is requires a pictorial representation of the relations of the system's operational windows . This situation is consistent with the evidence that humans tend to rely on a physical model for where to UNCLASSIFIED/fFOA: OFFICIO la Plili Oralla¥ 22
Not linked to a story yet.
Official release, from the pursue collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 57 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.