Irreducible Semi-Autonomous Adaptive Combat (ISAAC): An Artificial - Life Approach to Land Warfare

This study is a follow-on effort to a recently completed project, sponsored by the Commanding General, Marine Corps Combat Development Command, that assessed the general applicability of the new sciences to land warfare. 'New Sciences' is a catch-all phrase that refers to the tools and methodologies used in nonlinear dynamics and complex systems theory to study physical systems that exhibit a 'complicated dynamics.' CNA is currently developing a multiagent-based simulation of notional combat called ISAAC (Irreducible Semi-Autonomous Adaptive Combat), a preliminary version of which is described in this report. ISAAC takes a bottom-up, synthesist approach to the modeling of combat, vice the more traditional top-down, or reductionist approach.