The Convergence - The Army's Mad Scientist Podcast

In this latest episode of “ The Convergence ,” we talk with Keith Law , Senior Baseball Writer at The Athletic , which he joined in January 2020 after spending thirteen and a half years at ESPN . Before joining ESPN.com in June 2006, Keith spent just over four years as the Special Assistant to the GM of the Toronto Blue Jays , and prior to that had written for Baseball Prospectus . Keith Law is th...

In this latest episode of “ The Convergence ,” we talk with  Samantha North , cyber investigator and consultant, who is completing her final year of  a PhD in computational social science at the University of Bath . Ms. North’s research focuses on understanding the drivers of tribalism in online political behavior, using data science methods to analyze large data sets and behavioral psychology the...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk with guest bloggers LTC Arnel David , U.S. Army, and Major Aaron Moore , British Army, who recently penned Fight Club Prepares Lt Col Maddie Novák for Cross-Dimension Manoeuvre — describing the nascent revolution in Professional Military Education (PME) wrought by the convergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI), digital assistants, gaming, and A...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk with Lisa Kaplan , who founded Alethea Group to help organizations navigate the new digital reality and protect themselves against disinformation. Ms. Kaplan served as digital director for Senator Angus King’s 2018 campaign, where she designed and executed a strategy to identify, understand, and respond to disinformation. She is one of the few p...

In this latest episode of “ The Convergence ,” we talk with Molly Cain , founder of GovCity , the Nation’s first disruption and culture accelerator focused on government, civic, and culture change. Molly works at the intersection of technology and cultural disruption with broad ranging expertise in industry, startups, and helping the Federal Government tap into innovation with greater ambition and...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk with Cindy Otis, a disinformation expert specializing in election security, digital investigations, and messaging. She is a non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab. Prior to joining the private sector, she spent a decade as a CIA officer, serving as an intelligence analyst, briefer, and manager. Her reg...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk with Rob Albritton , Senior Director and AI Practice Lead at Octo Consulting Group . A former U.S. Army Geospatial Research Lab Scientist and Machine Learning Engineer at MITRE, Rob spent several years growing NVIDIA’s public sector team alongside the world’s foremost thought leaders on high-performance computing, AI, and deep learning. Rob now...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk with Kara Cunzeman , Lead Futurist for Strategic Foresight, with the Center for Space Policy and Strategy, at The Aerospace Corporation. In this role, Ms. Cunzeman is focused on cultivating a formalized approach to futures thinking through the strategic foresight Corporate Strategic Initiative (CSI), helping the enterprise adequately prepare its...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk with Dr. James Giordano, of the Georgetown University Medical Center. Dr. Giordano is the author of over 300 papers, 7 books, 21 book chapters, and 20 government white papers on brain science, national defense and ethics. In this episode, we break down the COVID-19 virus, the effect this pandemic has on the Nation, the impact on national securit...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we continue our discussions with research fellows from The College of William and Mary ’s Project on International Peace and Security (PIPS) . PIPS is one of the premier undergraduate think tanks in the country. Based at W&M’s Global Research Institute, PIPS is designed to bridge the gap between the academic and foreign policy communities in the are...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk to research fellows from The College of William and Mary ’s Project on International Peace and Security (PIPS) . PIPS is one of the premier undergraduate think tanks in the country. Based at W&M’s Global Research Institute, PIPS is designed to bridge the gap between the academic and foreign policy communities in the area of undergraduate edu...

In this latest episode of “The Convergence,” we talk to  Dr. Alexander Kott , Chief Scientist for the Army Research Lab (ARL) . In this role, he provides leadership in development of ARL’s technical strategy, maintaining the technical quality of ARL research, and representing ARL to the external technical community. In this episode, we discuss the Internet of Battlefield Things and modernizing the...

In the fifth episode of “The Convergence” we talk to  Zachery Tyson Brown , who is an Army veteran, analyst, consultant for the DoD, and Security fellow at the Truman National Security Project. Zach is a career intelligence officer now working at the intersection of emerging technologies, organizational structures, and strategic competition. Zach is most recently a graduate of the National Intelli...

In this episode, we talk with Michael Kanaan , Director of Operations for U.S. Air Force and MIT Artificial Intelligence. Following his graduation from the U.S. Air Force Academy he was the Officer in Charge of a $75 million hyperspectral mission at the National Air and Space Intelligence Center, and then the Assistant Director of Operations for the 417-member Geospatial Intelligence Squadron. Pri...

In this latest episode, we talk to LTG Eric Wesley , who is currently serving as the Director of the Futures and Concepts Center in Army Futures Command at Fort Eustis, VA. General Wesley has served in numerous operational units throughout his 34 year career and served as a staff officer and director at the Pentagon and White House. Prior to taking over the Futures and Concepts Center, General Wes...

The second episode of The Convergence features Dr. Margarita Konaev , Research Fellow at Georgetown University's Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET).  Dr. Konaev is an expert in Russian military innovation in emerging technologies and her research on international security, armed conflict, non-state actors and urban warfare in the Middle East, Russia, and Eurasia has been published...

The first episode of The Convergence features Dr. Sean McFate , foreign policy expert, author, and novelist. Dr. McFate is a Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council, a Washington DC think tank, and a professor of strategy at the National Defense University and Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. Additionally, he serves as an Advisor to Oxford University's Centre for Technology and Glo...