Keoki Jackson: Lockheed Martin | Lex Fridman Podcast #33

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   The following is a…

   1. LFLex Fridman0:00

      The following is a conversation with Keoke Jackson. He's the CTO of Lockheed Martin, a company that through its long history has created some of the most incredible engineering marvels human beings have ever built, including planes that fly fast and undetected, defense systems that intercept nuclear threats that can take the lives of millions, and systems that venture out into space, the moon, Mars and beyond. In these days, more and more, artificial intelligence has an assistive role to play in these systems. I've read several books in preparation for this conversation. It is a difficult one, because in part, Lockheed Martin builds military systems that operate in a complicated world that often does not have easy solutions, in the gray area between good and evil. I hope one day this world will rid itself of war in all its forms. But the path to achieving that in a world that does have evil is not obvious. What is obvious is good engineering and artificial intelligence research has a role to play on the side of good. Lockheed Martin and the rest of our community are hard at work at exactly this task. We talk about these and other important topics in this conversation. Also, most certainly, both Keoke and I have a passion for space, us humans venturing out toward the stars. We talk about this exciting future as well. This is the Artificial Intelligence podcast. If you enjoy it, subscribe on YouTube, give it five stars on iTunes, support it on Patreon, or simply connect with me on Twitter @lexfridman, spelled F-R-I-D-M-A-N. And now, here's my conversation with Keoke Jackson. I read several books on Lockheed Martin recently. My favorite in particular is by, uh, Ben Rich, called Skunk Works, personal memoir. It gets a little edgy at times. But from that, I was reminded, uh, that the engineers at Lockheed Martin have created some of the most incredible engineering marvels human beings have ever built throughout the cen- throughout the 20th century and the 21st. Do you remember a particular project or system at Lockheed, or before that, at the Space Shuttle Columbia that you were just in awe at the fact that us humans could create something like this?

   2. KJKeoki Jackson2:32

      You know, that's a, that's a great question. There's a lot of, uh, things that I could draw on there. When you look at the Skunk Works and Ben Rich's book in particular, of course it starts off with basically the start of the jet age, uh, and the P-80. I had the opportunity to sit next to one of the, uh, Apollo astronauts, uh, Charlie Duke, recently at dinner, and, uh, I said, "Hey, what's your favorite aircraft?" And he said, "Well, it was by far the F-104 Star Fighter," which was another, uh, aircraft that came out of Lockheed there.

   3. LFLex Fridman3:02

      What, what, what kind of-

   4. KJKeoki Jackson3:03

      It was, it was the first Mach 2, uh, um, uh, jet fighter aircraft. They called it the missile with a man in it. And so those are the kinds of things I grew up hearing stories about. You know, of course, the SR-71 is incomparable as, uh, you know, kind of the epitome of speed, altitude, and just the coolest looking aircraft ever. So, uh, so there's-

   5. LFLex Fridman3:27

      And that's a recognis- that's the plane that-

   6. KJKeoki Jackson3:29

      That's a, yeah, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft that was designed to be able to outrun, uh, basically go faster than any, uh, air defense system. But, uh, I, you know, I'll tell you, I'm a space junkin- uh, junkie, uh, that's why I came to MIT. That's really what took me, uh, ultimately to Lockheed Martin. And I grew up... And so Lockheed Martin, for example, has been, um, essentially at the heart of every planetary mission, uh, like all the Mars missions we've had a pla- a part in. And we've talked a lot about the 50th anniversary of Apollo here, uh, in the last couple of weeks, right? But, uh, remember 1976, uh, July 20th again, uh, National Space Day, so the landing of the Viking, uh, the Viking lander on m- on the surface of Mars. Just a huge accomplishment. And, uh, when I was a young engineer at Lockheed Martin, I got to meet engineers who had designed, you know, various pieces of that mission as well. So that's what I grew up on is these planetary missions, the start of the space shuttle era and, uh, and ultimately had the opportunity, uh, to see, uh, Lockheed Martin's part. And we can maybe talk about some of these, uh, here, but Lockheed Martin's part in all of these space journeys over the years.

   7. LFLex Fridman4:44

      Do you dream... And I apologize for getting philosophical at times or sentimental. I do re- romanticize the notion of space exploration. So, do you dream of the day when us humans colonize another planet like Mars or a man, a woman, a human being steps on, on Mars?

   8. KJKeoki Jackson5:03

      Absolutely. And, uh, that's a personal dream of mine. Uh, I haven't given up yet on my own, uh, opportunity to fly into space but...

   9. LFLex Fridman5:11

      (laughs)

   10. KJKeoki Jackson5:11

       But as, you know, from the Lockheed Martin perspective, this is something that we're working towards every day. And, uh, of course, you know, we're, we're building the Orion spacecraft, which is the most sophisticated, uh, human-rated spacecraft ever built. And it's really designed for these deep space journeys, you know, starting with the moon, but ultimately going to Mars and, uh, being the platform, uh, you know, from a design perspective, uh, what we call the, the Mars base camp, to be able to take humans to the surface, and then after a mission of a couple of weeks, bring them back up safely. And so that is something I want to see happen during my time at Lockheed Martin. So I'm, uh, I'm pretty excited about that. And I think, uh, you know, once we prove that's possible, uh, you know, c- colonization might be, you know, a little bit further out, but it's something that, uh, I'd hope to see.

   11. LFLex Fridman6:00

       So maybe you can give a, a little bit of an overview of... So Lockheed Martin is partner with, uh...... a few years ago with Boeing to work with the DOD and NASA to build launch systems and rockets with ULA. Uh, what's beyond that? What's Lockheed's mission timeline long-term dream in terms of space? You mentioned, uh, the moon. I've heard you talk about asteroids, as Mars... What's the timeline, what's the engineering challenges, and what's the dream, long-term?

   12. KJKeoki Jackson6:31

       Yeah. I think the dream long-term is to have a permanent presence in space beyond low earth orbit, ultimately with a, a long-term presence on the moon, and then to the planets, to Mars. And, uh-

   13. LFLex Fridman6:44

       Sorry to interrupt on that.

   14. KJKeoki Jackson6:45

       Yeah.

   15. LFLex Fridman6:45

       So long-term presence means-

   16. KJKeoki Jackson6:48

       Sustained and sustainable presence, and an economy, a space economy that really goes alongside that.

   17. LFLex Fridman6:54

       With human beings being ... and being able to launch perhaps from those ... So like hop? (laughs)

   18. KJKeoki Jackson7:02

       Uh, you know, it's a-

   19. LFLex Fridman7:02

       Is that a-

   20. KJKeoki Jackson7:03

       There's a lot of energy, uh, that goes in those hops, right?

   21. LFLex Fridman7:06

       Right.

   22. KJKeoki Jackson7:06

       So, uh, I think the first step is being able to get there and to be able to establish sustained bases, right? And, uh, and build from there. And a lot of that means getting, as you know, things like the cost of a launch down, and, uh, you mentioned United Launch Alliance, and, uh, so I, I don't want to speak for ULA, but obviously they're, uh, they're working really hard to, uh, on their next generation of space, or of launch vehicles, uh, to, you know, maintain that incredible mission success record that ULA has, but ultimately continue to drive down the cost and make the flexibility, the speed, and the, uh, access, uh, ever greater.

   23. LFLex Fridman7:47

       So what's the missions that are in the horizon that you could talk to?

   24. KJKeoki Jackson7:51

       No, I-

   25. LFLex Fridman7:52

       Is there a hope to get to the moon

   26. NANarrator7:53

       Yeah, the-

   27. KJKeoki Jackson7:53

       Absolutely, absolutely. I mean, and it's-

   28. LFLex Fridman7:55

       Uh-huh.

   29. KJKeoki Jackson7:55

       I think you know this, uh, or you may know this, you know, there's a lot of ways to accomplish some of these goals. And so, uh, that's a lot of what's in discussion today. But ultimately, the, the goal is to be able to establish a base, um, essentially in cislunar space that would allow for ready, uh, transfer, uh, from orbit to the lunar surface and back again. And so that's sort of that near-term, and when I say near-term, in the next decade or so vision, starting off with a, you know, a stated objective by this administration to get back to the moon in the 19- or the 2024 or 2025 timeframe, which is, uh, is right around the corner here. So, uh-

   30. LFLex Fridman8:37

       How big of an engineering challenge is that?
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   Yeah. There's some interesting…

   1. KJKeoki Jackson15:00

   2. LFLex Fridman15:00

      Yeah. There's some interesting stuff we'll talk about on the teaming side here on Earth that's, uh, that's pretty cool to explore 100% again.

   3. KJKeoki Jackson15:06

      And in space. Let's not leave the space piece out.

   4. LFLex Fridman15:08

      So what is teaming? What is AI and humans working together in space look like?

   5. KJKeoki Jackson15:14

      Yeah. One of the things we're working on is a system called MAIA, uh, which is you can think of it, uh, it- so it's an AI system and, uh-

   6. LFLex Fridman15:22

      In space.

   7. KJKeoki Jackson15:22

      ... in space. Exactly. And, uh, you think of it as the Alexa in space, right?

   8. LFLex Fridman15:27

      Right.

   9. KJKeoki Jackson15:28

      But this goes hand in hand with a lot of other developments. And so today's world, everything is essentially model-based, model-based, uh, systems engineering to the actual digital tapestry that goes through the design, the build, the manufacture, the testing, and ultimately the sustainment of these system. And so our vision is really that, you know, when our astronauts are there around Mars, they- you're gonna have that entire digital library of the spacecraft, of its operations, all the test data, all the test data and flight data from previous missions to be able to look and see if there are anomalous conditions and tell the, uh, humans, uh, and potentially deal with that before it becomes a, uh, a, a bad situation, and help the astronauts work through those kinds of things. And it's not just, uh, you know, dealing with problems as they come up, but also offering up opportunities for additional exploration capability, for example. So, so that's-

   10. LFLex Fridman16:33

       Right.

   11. KJKeoki Jackson16:33

       ... the vision is that, you know, these are g- gonna take the best of the human to respond to, uh, to changing circumstances and rely on the best, uh, AI capabilities to monitor these, you know, this almost infinite number of data points and correlations of data points that humans frankly aren't that good at.

   12. LFLex Fridman16:54

       So how do you develop systems in space like this? Uh, whether it's a (laughs) Alexa in space or in general, any kind of control systems, uh, any kind of intelligence systems, when you can't really test stuff too much out in space? It's very expensive to test stuff.

   13. KJKeoki Jackson17:10

       Yeah.

   14. LFLex Fridman17:10

       So how do you develop such systems?

   15. KJKeoki Jackson17:14

       Yeah. That's, uh, that- that's the beauty of this digital twin, if you will. Uh, and of course with Lockheed Martin, we've over the past, you know, five plus decades been refining our knowledge of the space environment, of how materials behave, uh, dynamics, uh, the controls, the, uh, you know, radiation environments, all of these kinds of things. So we're able to create very sophisticated models. They're not perfect, but they're, uh, they're very good. And so you can actually do a lot of... And I, I spent part of my career, you know, simulating, uh, com- communication spacecraft, uh, you know, missile warning spacecraft, GPS spacecraft, in all kinds of scenarios and all kinds of environments. So this is really just taking that to the next level. The interesting thing is that now you're bringing into that loop a system, depending on how it's developed, that may be non-deterministic, it may be learning as it goes, and in fact-

   16. LFLex Fridman18:13

       Right.

   17. KJKeoki Jackson18:13

       ... we anticipate that it will be learning as it goes, and so that brings a whole new, uh, level of interest, I guess, into how do you do verification and validation of these non-deterministic learning systems in scenarios that may go out of the bounds or the envelope that you have initially designed them to?

   18. LFLex Fridman18:35

       So had s- this system and its intelligence has the same complexity, uh, some of the same complexity a human does in the... It learns over time, it's unpredictable in certain kinds of ways in the... So you, you still, you also have to model that when, when you're thinking about it. So in your, in your thoughts, it's possible-... to model the, the majority of situations, the, the important aspects of situations here on Earth and in space enough to test stuff?

   19. KJKeoki Jackson19:02

       Yeah. That's, this is really an active area of research, and we're actually funding university (laughs) research in a variety of places, including MIT. And this is in the realm of trust and verification and validation of, I'd say, autonomous systems in general, and then as a subset of that, autonomous systems that incorporate artificial intelligence capabilities. And this is, uh, this is not an easy problem. Um, we're working with startup companies. We've got internal R&D, but, you know, our conviction is that autonomy and, more and more, AI-enabled autonomy, is gonna be in everything that Lockheed Martin develops and fields, and it's gonna be retrofi- you know, it, autonomy and, and AI are gonna be retrofit into existing systems. They're gonna be part of the design for all of our future systems. And so maybe I should take a step back and say the way we define autonomy.

   20. LFLex Fridman19:58

       Mm-hmm.

   21. KJKeoki Jackson19:58

       So we tu- we talk about autonomy, essentially, a system that composes, selects, and then executes decisions with varying levels of human intervention.

   22. LFLex Fridman20:11

       Mm-hmm.

   23. KJKeoki Jackson20:12

       And so you could think of no autonomy, so this is essentially the human doing the task. You can think of s- um, effectively partial autonomy, where the human is in the loop, uh, so making decisions, uh, i- in every case about what the autonomous system can do.

   24. LFLex Fridman20:31

       Either in the cockpit or remotely.

   25. KJKeoki Jackson20:33

       Or remotely, exactly, but still in that control loop. And then there's what you'd call supervisory autonomy. So the autonomous system is doing most of the work. The human can intervene to stop it or to change the direction. And then ultimately, fol- full autonomy, where the human is off the loop altogether, and for different types of missions, wanna have different levels of autonomy. So now, take that spectrum and this conviction that autonomy and more and more AI are in everything that we develop. Uh, the kinds of things that Lockheed Martin does, you know, a lot of times, are safety of life critical kinds of missions. Uh, you know, think about aircraft, for example. Um, and so we require, and our customers require, an extremely high level of confidence. Uh, one, that, you know, we're gonna protect life. Uh, two, that we're going to, uh, that these systems will behave in ways that their operators can understand. And so this gets into that whole field. Again, you know, that, it, being able to verify and validate, uh, that the systems have been, uh, that they will operate the way they're designed and the way they're expected. And furthermore, that they will do that in ways that can be explained and understood, and that is an extremely difficult challenge.

   26. LFLex Fridman21:58

       Yeah, so here's a difficult question. I don't mean to, uh, uh, bring this up, but I think it's a good case study that people are familiar with. Uh, Boeing 737 Max commercial airplane has had two recent crashes where their flight control software system failed, and it, it's software. So I don't mean to speak about Boeing, but broadly speaking, we have this in the autonomous vehicle space too, semi-autonomous. When you have millions of lines of code, software, making decisions, th- there is a little bit of a clash of cultures, because software engineers don't have the same culture of safety, often, uh, that people who build systems like at Lockheed Martin, uh, do, where it has to be exceptionally safe, you have to test this on. So how do we get this right when software is making so many decisions?

   27. KJKeoki Jackson22:53

       Yeah. And this, uh, there, there's a lot of things that have to happen, and by and large, I think it starts with the culture, right, which is n- not necessarily something that, A, is taught in school-

   28. LFLex Fridman23:06

       Mm-hmm.

   29. KJKeoki Jackson23:06

       ... or B, is something that would come, you know, and depending on what kind of software you're developing, it m- may not be relevant, right, if you're targeting ads or something like that.

   30. LFLex Fridman23:15

       Yeah.
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   So the- the carriers,…

   1. KJKeoki Jackson30:00

      protects, you know, carrier strike groups, for example, from incoming ballistic missile threats, aircraft threats, cruise missile threats, and, you know, kind of go down the list.

   2. LFLex Fridman30:10

      So the- the carriers, the fleet itself is the thing that is being protected. N- the carriers aren't serving as a protection for something else?

   3. KJKeoki Jackson30:19

      Well, that's- that's a little bit of a different application.

   4. LFLex Fridman30:21

      Okay.

   5. KJKeoki Jackson30:21

      We've actually built a version called Aegis Ashore, which is now deployed in a couple of places around the world.

   6. LFLex Fridman30:27

      All right.

   7. KJKeoki Jackson30:28

      So that same technolo- I mean, basically, uh, it can be used to protect either an ocean-going fleet or a land-based, uh, activity. Another one, the THAAD program. So THAAD, th- this is the Theater High Altitude Area Defense. This is to protect, you know, relatively broad areas against, uh, sophisticated, uh, ballistic missile threats. And so, uh, now, uh, you know, it's deployed, uh, with a lot of US capabilities, and now we have international customers, uh, that are looking to buy that capability as well. And so these are systems that defend, not just defend militaries and military capabilities, but defend population areas. Um, you know, we saw, you know, maybe the first-... public use of these, uh, back in the, in the first, uh, Gulf War with the Patriot systems. And these are, these are the kinds of things that Lockheed Martin, uh, delivers. Um, and there's a lot of stuff that goes with it, so think about the radar systems and the sensing systems that cue these, the, the command and control systems that decide how you pair a w- a weapon against an incoming threat, and then all the human and machine interfaces, uh, to make sure that they can be operated successfully in very, uh, strenuous environments.

   8. LFLex Fridman31:51

      Yeah, there's, uh, there's some incredible engineering, uh, that, uh, at every front, like y- like, like you said. So maybe if we just take a look at s-, uh, Lockheed history broadly, maybe even looking at Skunk Works, w- what are the biggest, most impressive milestones of innovations? If you look at stealth, I would have called you crazy if you said that's possible at the time, uh, and supersonic and hypersonic, so traveling at ... First of all, traveling at the speed of sound is pretty damn fast. (laughs) And the supersonic and hypersonic, three, four, five times the speed of sound, that seems ... I would also call you crazy if you say you can do that. So can you tell me how it's possible to do these kinds of things, and is there other milestones and i- innovation that's going on we can talk about?

   9. KJKeoki Jackson32:45

      Yeah. Well, let me start, uh, you know, on the Skunk Works saga, and, and you kind of alluded to it in the beginning. I mean, Skunk Works is as much a idea as a place, and so it's driven really by Kelly Johnson's 14 principles, and I'm not gonna list all 14 of 'em off, but the idea ... And this, I'm sure, will resonate with any engineer who's worked on a highly motivated small team before, uh, the idea that if you can essentially have a small team of very capably, capable people who wanna work on really hard problems, you can do almost anything, especially if you kinda shield them from, uh, bureaucratic influences, if you create very tight relationships with your customers so that you have that, uh, that team and c- shared vision with the customer. Uh, those are the kinds of things, uh, that enabled the Skunk Works to do these, these incredible things. And, uh, you know, we listed off a number, and you, you brought up stealth, and I mean, this, this whole ... You know, I wish I could've seen Ben Rich with a ball bearing, you know-

   10. LFLex Fridman33:51

       Yeah, that's- (laughs)

   11. KJKeoki Jackson33:51

       ... rolling it across the desk, uh, to a general officer and saying, "Would you like to have an aircraft that has the radar cross-section of this ball bearing?" Probably one of the gr- you know, the m- the least expensive and most effective marketing campaigns in the history of the industry. Uh-

   12. LFLex Fridman34:08

       So just for people that are not familiar, I mean, the way you detect aircraft is, I mean, I'm sure there's a lot of ways, uh, but radar, for the longest time, y- there's a big blob that appears in the radar. How do you make a plane disappear so it looks as big as a, a ball bearing? What's involved in technology-wise there? What's, um, broadly sort of a- (laughs) the stuff you can speak about-

   13. KJKeoki Jackson34:32

       Yeah. (laughs) I'll stick to what's in, uh, Ben Rich's book-

   14. LFLex Fridman34:34

       Yeah.

   15. KJKeoki Jackson34:34

       But obviously, the geometry of how radar gets reflected and the kinds of materials that either reflect or absorb, uh, are com- kind of the, couple of the critical elements there. Um, and it's a cat and mouse game, right? I mean, you know, radars get better, stealth capabilities get better, and so it's a, it's a really a game of, of continuous improvement and innovation there, and I'll leave it at that.

   16. LFLex Fridman35:00

       Yeah, so the, uh, the idea, uh, that something is essentially invisible is, uh, is quite fascinating. But the other one is flying fast, so speed of sound is 750, 60 miles an hour, uh, w- so supersonic is three, you know, Mach 3, something like that, so somewhere there?

   17. KJKeoki Jackson35:19

       Yeah, we talk about ... So supersonic obviously, and we kinda talk about that as that realm from Mach 1 up through about Mach 5.

   18. LFLex Fridman35:26

       Right.

   19. KJKeoki Jackson35:26

       And then hypersonic, uh, so, you know, high supersonic speeds, uh, would be past Mach 5. And you gotta remember, uh, you know, Lockheed Martin and actually other companies have been involved in hypersonic development since the late '60s, um, you know? You think of everything from the X-15 to the space shuttle as examples of that. I think the difference now is, uh, if you look around the world, um, particularly the threat environment, uh, that we're in today, you're starting to see, you know, publicly, uh, the, uh, folks like the Russians and the Chinese, um, saying they have hypersonic, uh, weapons capability that could threaten, uh, US and allied, uh, capabilities, and also m- basically, you know, the claims are that these could get around defensive systems that are out there today. And so there's a real sense of urgency. You hear it from, uh, folks like the, uh, Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, Dr. Mike Griffin, and others in the Department of Defense that hypersonics is, uh, is something that's really important to the nation, m- in terms of both parity, but also in defensive capabilities. And so, uh, that's something that, you know, we're pleased, and it's something that Lockheed Martin's, you know, had a heritage in. Uh, we've invested, uh, R&D dollars on our side for many years, and, uh, we have a number of things going on with various, uh, US government customers, uh, in that field today that we're very excited about. So I, I would anticipate we'll be hearing more about that in the future from our customers.

   20. LFLex Fridman37:06

       And I've actually haven't read much about this. Probably you can't talk about much of it at all, but on the defensive side is the fascinating problem of perception, of trying to detect things that are really hard to see.Can you comment on how hard that problem is and, uh, the, how, how hard is it to stay ahead? Uh, e- even if we go back a few decades, h- how, stay ahead of the competition in that regard?

   21. KJKeoki Jackson37:30

       Well, may- maybe I, I... Again, you gotta think of these as ongoing d- capability development.

   22. LFLex Fridman37:36

       Excuse me.

   23. KJKeoki Jackson37:36

       And, uh, so think back to the early phase of missile defense, so this would be in the '80s, uh, the SDI program, and in that timeframe, we proved, uh, and Lockheed Martin proved that you could hit a bullet with a bullet, essentially, and, uh, and which is something that had never been done before to take out an incoming, uh, ballistic missile. And so that's led to these incredible hit-to-kill kinds of capabilities, uh, PAC-3, um, that's the Patriot Advanced Capability, uh, uh, Model 3 that Lockheed Martin builds, the THAAD system that I, uh, that I talked about. Um, so now, hypersonics, uh, you know, they're different from ballistic systems, and so we gotta take the next step, uh, in defensive capability.

   24. LFLex Fridman38:21

       (laughs) I can, uh, I'll l- I'll leave that there, but I can only imagine. Now, let me just comment, sort of as an engineer, it, it's sad to know that so much that Lockheed has done in the past is classified or today, you know, a- and it's shrouded in secrecy. It has to be, uh, by the nature of the application. (sighs) So like what, what I do, so we, what we do here at MIT, we like to inspire young engineers, uh, young scientists, and yet, in the Lockheed case, some of that engineering has to stay quiet. Ho- how do you think about that? How does that make you feel? Is there a future where more can be shown or is it just the nature, th- the nature of this world that it has to remain secret?

   25. KJKeoki Jackson39:13

       It's a good question. I think, you know, the public can see enough of, a- and- and including students who may be in grade school, high school, college today, uh, to understand the kinds of really hard problems that we work on.

   26. LFLex Fridman39:33

       Right.

   27. KJKeoki Jackson39:34

       And, uh, I mean, look at the F-35, right? And, uh, y- you know, obviously a lot of the detailed performance levels are, are sensitive and controlled, but, you know, we can talk about what an incredible aircraft this is. It's, you know, a supersonic, super cruise kind of a fighter, a, uh, a, uh, you know, stealth capabilities. It's a flying information, you know, system in the sky with, uh, data fusion, sensor fusion capabilities that have never been seen before. So these are the kinds of things that I believe, you know, those, these are the kinds of things that got me excited when I was a student, and I think these still inspire, uh, students today. And the other thing I would say, I mean, you know, people are inspired by space. Uh, people are inspired by aircraft. Um, our employees are also inspired by that sense of mission.

   28. LFLex Fridman40:25

       Mm-hmm. Yeah.

   29. KJKeoki Jackson40:25

       And I will, I'll just give you an example. I had the privilege to work and m- and lead our GPS programs for some time, and, uh, that was a case where, you know, I actually worked on a program that touches billions of people every day, and so when I said, "I worked on GPS," everybody knew what I was talking about, even though they didn't maybe appreciate the technical challenges, uh, that went into that. Uh, but I'll tell you, I, I got a briefing one time from a major in the Air Force, uh, and, uh, he said, "I, I go by call sign GIMP. GPS is my passion."

   30. LFLex Fridman41:03

       (laughs)
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   9 Gs. …

   1. KJKeoki Jackson45:00

      we demonstrated all kinds of maneuvers and various mission scenarios with the autonomous F-16 being that so-called loyal or trusted wingman. And so those are the kinds of things that, you know, we've shown what is possible now, uh, given that you've up-leveled that pilot to be a mission manager, now they can control multiple other aircraft. Think of them almost as extensions of your own aircraft flying alongside with you. So that's a, that's another example of how this is really coming to fruition. And then, uh, you know, I- I mentioned the- the landings, but, um, think about just the implications for humans and flight safety, and this goes a little bit back to the discussion we were having about how do you continuously improve the level of sa- safety through automation while working through the complexities that automation introduces? So one of the challenges that you have in high-performance fighter aircraft is what's called G-LOC, so this is G-induced loss of consciousness. So you pull 9 Gs, you're wearing a pressure suit-

   2. LFLex Fridman46:02

      9 Gs.

   3. KJKeoki Jackson46:02

      ... that's not enough to keep the blood going to your brain.

   4. LFLex Fridman46:05

      Yep.

   5. KJKeoki Jackson46:05

      You black out.

   6. LFLex Fridman46:06

      Right.

   7. KJKeoki Jackson46:07

      Right? And, uh, of course, that's bad if you happen to be flying, uh, low, you know, near the deck, and, uh, you know, or an obstacle or terrain environment. And so we developed a system, uh, in our aeronautics, uh, division called Auto G-CAS, so autonomous ground collision avoidance system. And, uh, we built that into the F-16. It's actually saved seven aircraft, eight pilots already, uh, in the relatively short time it's been deployed. It was so successful that, uh, the, uh, Air Force said, "Hey, we need to have this in the F-35 right away." So we've actually gone, done testing of that now on the F-35. Um, and we've also integrated an autonomous air collision avoidance system, so think the air-to-air problem. So now it's the integrated collision avoidance system, uh, but the- these are the kinds of capabilities... You know, I wouldn't call them AI. I mean, they are very sophisticated models, uh, you know, of the aircraft's dynamics coupled with the terrain models to be able to predict when essentially, you know, the pilot is doing something that, you know, is gonna take the aircraft into... Or the pilot's not doing something, in this case. Uh, but those, you know, just gives you an example of how, uh, autonomy can be really a lifesaver, um, in today's world.

   8. LFLex Fridman47:26

      It's like a autonomous emergence, uh, automated emergency braking in cars. But is there any exploration of perception of, uh, for example, detecting a G-LOC that the pilot has, is out? So as opposed to perceiving the external environment to infer that the pilot is out, but actually perceiving the pilot directly?

   9. KJKeoki Jackson47:47

      Yeah, this is one of those cases where you'd like to, you know, not take action if you think the pilot's there.

   10. LFLex Fridman47:52

       Yeah.

   11. KJKeoki Jackson47:52

       And it's almost like, uh, systems that try to detect if a driver's falling asleep on the road, right?

   12. LFLex Fridman47:57

       That's right, yeah. Yeah.

   13. KJKeoki Jackson47:57

       With limited success, uh...

   14. LFLex Fridman48:00

       Yeah.

   15. KJKeoki Jackson48:00

       So, uh, I mean, this is what I call the system of last resort, right? Where if the-

   16. LFLex Fridman48:04

       Gotcha.

   17. KJKeoki Jackson48:04

       ... if the aircraft has determined that it's going into the terrain, get it out of there. And, uh, and this is not something that we're just doing in the, um, in the aircraft world, and I wanted to highlight, uh, we have a technology we call Matrix, but this is, uh, developed at Sikorsky Innovations. The whole idea there is what we call, uh, optimal piloting. So not optional piloting or unpiloted, but optimal piloting. So an FAA-certified system, so, and you have a high degree of confidence. It's generally pretty deterministic, so if, uh, and we know that it'll do in different situations. Um, but effectively be able, you know, to fly a mission with two pilots, one pilot, no pilots.

   18. LFLex Fridman48:51

       (laughs)

   19. KJKeoki Jackson48:51

       And, uh, and have (laughs) , you can think of it almost as like a dial of the level of autonomy that you want. But able, so it's running in the background at all times, and able to pick up tasks, whether it's, you know, sort of autopilot kinds of tasks or- or more, uh, sophisticated path-planning kinds of activities. To be able to do things like, for example, land on an oil rig, you know, in the North Sea in bad weather, zero, zero conditions. And you can imagine, of course, there's a lot of military utility to capability like that. Uh, you could have an aircraft, uh, that you wanna send out for a crude mission, but then in the, at night if you wanna use it to deliver supplies in an unmanned mode, that- that could be done as well. And so there's- there's- there's clear advantages, uh, there. Uh, but think about on the commercial side, you know, if you're an aircraft taking...... you're gonna fly out to this oil rig, and if you get out there and you can't land, then you gotta bring all those people back, reschedule another flight, pay the overtime for the crew that you just brought back 'cause they didn't get where they were going, pay for the overtime for-

   20. LFLex Fridman49:56

       Right.

   21. KJKeoki Jackson49:56

       ... the folks that are out there on the oil rig. This is real economic, uh, you know, and these are dollars and cents kinds of advantages that we're bringing in the commercial world as well.

   22. LFLex Fridman50:06

       So this is a, a difficult question from the AI space that I would love it if you're able to comment. So a lot of this autonomy in AI you've mentioned just now has this empowering effect. One is the last resort, it keeps you safe. The other is there's a, with the teaming and, in general, um, assistive, uh, assistive AI. Uh, and I think there's a, there's always a race. So th- the world is full of... The world is complex. It's full of, uh, uh, bad actors, so there's, there's often a race to make sure that we keep this, uh, this country safe, right? Th- but with AI, it, there is a concern that it's a slightly different race. Uh, there's a lot of people in the AI space that are concerned about the AI arms race, that as opposed to U- the United States becoming, you know, um, having the best technology and therefore keeping us safe, it, we, even we lose ability to s- keep control of it. So this, uh, the AI arms race getting away from all of us humans. So do you share this worry? Do you share this concern when we are talking about military applications, that too much control and decision-making capability is giving to software or A- AI?

   23. KJKeoki Jackson51:31

       Well, I, I don't see it happening today. And in fact, this is something, from a policy perspective, uh, you know, it's, it's obviously a very dynamic space, but the Department of Defense has put quite a bit of thought into that. And maybe before talking about the policy, I'll just talk about some of the why. And you alluded to it, it being a sort of a complicated and a little bit scary world out there. But there's some, um, big things happening today. You hear a lot of talk now about a return to great powers competition, particularly around China and Russia, uh, with the US, but there are some other big players out there as well. And what we've seen is, uh, the deployment of some very, uh, uh, I'd say, concerning new weapon systems, uh, you know, particularly with Russia and breaching, uh, some of the I- IRBM, intermediate-range ballistic missile treaties. That's been in the news a lot. Um, you know, the building of islands, uh, artificial islands in the South China Sea by the Chinese and then arming, uh, those islands, um, the annexation of Crimea, uh, by Russia, the invasion of Ukraine, uh, so there's, there's some pretty scary things. And then you add on top of that, uh, the North Korean threat has certainly not gone away.

   24. LFLex Fridman52:53

       Yeah.

   25. KJKeoki Jackson52:53

       There's a lot going on in the Middle East with Iran in particular. And, uh, we see this global terrorism threat, uh, uh, has not abated, right? So there are a lot of reasons to look for technology to assist with those problems, whether it's AI or other technologies, like hypersonics, which, which we discussed. So now, let me give just a couple of hypotheticals. So people react sort of in the second timeframe, right? You know, y- you're, your, you know, photon hitting your eye to, you know, movement is, you know, on the order of a few tenths of a second kinds of, uh, of processing time. Roughly speaking, you know, computers are operating in the nanosecond timescale, right? So just to bring home what that means, a nanosecond to a second is like a second to 32 years. So seconds on the battlefield, in that sense, literally are lifetimes.

   26. LFLex Fridman53:56

       (laughs)

   27. KJKeoki Jackson53:56

       And so if you can bring an autonomous or AI-enabled capability that will enable the human to shrink wa- uh, maybe you've heard the term-

   28. LFLex Fridman54:06

       Mm-hmm.

   29. KJKeoki Jackson54:06

       ... the OODA loop. So this whole idea that a typical battlefield decision is characterized by, uh, observe, so information comes in, orient, how does that, what does that mean in the context, decide what do I do about it, and then act, take that action. If you can use these capabilities to compress that OODA loop, uh, to stay inside what your adversary is doing, that's an incredible, um, uh, uh, powerful force on the battlefield.

   30. LFLex Fridman54:37

       That's a really nice way to put it, that the role of AI in computing in general has a lot to benefit from just, uh, decreasing from 32 years to one second, as opposed to on the scale of seconds and minutes and hours making decisions that humans-
5. 1:00:00 – 1:12:50

   What is involved in…

   1. KJKeoki Jackson1:00:00

      the kinds of, you know, incredibly destructive world wars that we saw in the first half of the 20th century. Now, things have gotten more complicated since that time and since the Cold War. Uh, it is more of a multipolar great powers world today. Uh, just to give you an example, back then, you know, there were, you know, in the, in the Cold War timeframe, just a handful of nations that had ballistic missile capability. Uh, by last count, and this is a few years old, there's over 70 nations today that have that, uh, similar kinds of numbers in terms of space-based capabilities. So, so the world has gotten more complex and more challenging, and the threats, I think, have proliferated, uh, in ways that we didn't expect. You know, the, the nation today is in the middle of a recapitalization of our strategic deterrent. Uh, I look at that as one of the most important things that our nation can do.

   2. LFLex Fridman1:01:00

      What is involved in deterrents? Is it, is it being ready to attack or is it the defensive systems that catch attacks?

   3. KJKeoki Jackson1:01:11

      A little bit of both. And so it's a complicated game theoretical kinda program.

   4. LFLex Fridman1:01:16

      Mm-hmm.

   5. KJKeoki Jackson1:01:16

      But, uh, ultimately, um, we are trying to prevent the use of any of these weapons, and the theory behind prevention is that, um, even if an adversary uses a weapon against you, you have the capability to essentially strike back and do harm to them, uh, that's unacceptable. And so that will deter them from-... you know, making use of these weapon systems. Um, the deterrence calculus has changed, of course, with, uh, you know, more nations now having these kinds of weapons. But I think, you know, from my perspective, it's very important, uh, you know, to maintain a strategic deterrent, you have to have systems that you will know, you know will work when they're required to work. Uh, you know that they have to be adaptable to a variety of different scenarios in today's world. And so that's what this recapitalization of systems that were built, uh, over previous decades, making sure that they are appropriate, not just for today, but for the decades to come. So the other thing I, I'd really like to note is strategic deterrence has a very different, um, uh, character today. Uh, you know, we used to think of weapons of mass destruction in terms of nuclear, chemical, biological, and today we have a cyber-threat. Um, we've seen examples of the use of cyber, uh, weaponry and uh, if you think about the possibilities of using cyber capabilities or an adversary attacking the US to take out things like critical infrastructure, electrical grids, water systems, um, those are scenarios that are strategic in nature to the survival of a nation as well. So that is the kind of world that we live in today, um, and, you know, part of my hope on this is, one, that we can also develop technical or technological systems, perhaps enabled by AI and autonomy, that will allow us to contain and to fight back against these kinds of, uh, new threats that were not conceived when we first developed our strategic deterrents.

   6. LFLex Fridman1:03:46

      Yeah, I know that Lockheed is involved with cyber, so

   7. NANarrator1:03:49

      Mm-hmm.

   8. LFLex Fridman1:03:49

      ... I saw that, that you, you mentioned that. Uh, it's, (laughs) it's an incredibly cha... Nuclear almost seems easier than cyber 'cause there's so many attack, like there's so many ways that cyber can evolve in such an uncertain future. But talking about engineering with a mission, I mean, uh, in this case, that you're engineering systems that, uh, basically save the world. (laughs) It's, uh-

   9. KJKeoki Jackson1:04:14

      Well, like, like I said, we-

   10. LFLex Fridman1:04:15

       ... quite-

   11. KJKeoki Jackson1:04:15

       ... uh, we're privileged to do s- to work on some very challenging problems for, uh, for very critical customers here in the US and with our allies abroad as well.

   12. LFLex Fridman1:04:25

       (inhales deeply) Lockheed builds both military and non-military systems, and perhaps the future of Lockheed may be more in non-military applications, if you talk about space and beyond. I say that as a preface to a difficult question. So President Eisenhower in 1961 in his farewell address talked about the military-industrial complex and that it shouldn't grow beyond what is needed. So what are your thoughts on those words, on the military-industrial complex, on the concern of growth of their developments beyond what may be needed?

   13. KJKeoki Jackson1:05:07

       That what, where it may be needed, uh, is a critical phrase, of course.

   14. LFLex Fridman1:05:12

       Right.

   15. KJKeoki Jackson1:05:12

       And, and I, I think it is worth pointing out, as you noted, that Lockheed Martin, we are in a number of commercial businesses from energy to space to commercial aircraft. And so I, I wouldn't, and I wouldn't neglect the importance of those, uh, parts of our business as well. Uh, I think the world is dynamic and, uh, you know, there was a time, and it doesn't seem that long ago to me, it was, uh, while I was a graduate student, uh, here at MIT and we were talking about the peace dividend at the end of the Cold War. If you look at expenditure on military systems as a fraction of GDP, we're far below peak levels, um, uh, of the past. And, uh, to me at least, it looks like a time where you're seeing global threats changing in a way that would warrant, you know, rel- relevant, uh, investments in defense, uh, defensive capabilities. Um, the other thing I'd note, uh, for military and defensive systems, um, it's, it's not quite a free market, right? We don't sell to, you know, people on the street. And that warrants a very close partnership between, you know, I'd say the customers and the people that design, build, uh, and maintain these systems because of the very unique nature, the, the very difficult requirements, the very, uh, great importance on, you know, safety and on, uh, you know, operating the way they're intended every time. And so that does create... And, and it's frankly, it's one of Lockheed Martin's great strengths is that we have this expertise built up over many years in partnership with our customers to be able to design and build these systems that meet these very unique, uh, mission needs.

   16. LFLex Fridman1:07:11

       Yeah, because building those systems is very costly. There's very (laughs) little room for mistake. I mean, it's, uh, yeah, just, uh, Ben Rich's book and so on just tells the story, it's nerve-wracking just reading it. (laughs) If you're an engineer, it reads like a thriller. Okay. Uh, let me... Let's go back to space for a second. (laughs) I guess, uh-

   17. KJKeoki Jackson1:07:30

       I'm always happy to go back to space.

   18. LFLex Fridman1:07:33

       (laughs) So, um, a, a few quick, maybe out there, maybe fun questions, maybe a little provocative. What, what are your thoughts on the efforts of, uh...... the new folks, SpaceX and Elon Musk. What are your thoughts about what Elon is doing? Do you see him as competition? Do you enjoy competition? Or what are your thoughts?

   19. KJKeoki Jackson1:07:56

       Oh, yeah. First of all, uh, certainly Elon, uh, I would say SpaceX-

   20. LFLex Fridman1:08:01

       SpaceX.

   21. KJKeoki Jackson1:08:01

       ... and some of his o- and some of his other ventures are definitely a competitive force in the, uh, in the space industry. And do we like competition? Yeah, we do.

   22. LFLex Fridman1:08:11

       (laughs)

   23. KJKeoki Jackson1:08:11

       And, uh, and, uh, we think we're, uh, very strong competitors. I think it's in- you know, competition is what the US is founded on in, in a lot of ways, and, uh, always coming up with a better way. And I, I think it's really important to continue, uh, you know, to have fresh eyes coming in, new innovation. Uh, I do think it's important to have level playing fields, and so, uh, you wanna make sure that, uh, that you're not giving, n- different requirements to different players. But, uh, you know, I tell people, and you know, I spend a lot of time at places like MIT, I'm gonna be at the MIT, uh, Beaver Works Summer Institute-

   24. LFLex Fridman1:08:50

       Mm-hmm.

   25. KJKeoki Jackson1:08:50

       ... over the weekend here. And I tell people, "This is the most exciting time to be in the space business in my entire life." And it is this explosion of new capabilities, uh, that have been driven by things like the, you know, the massive increase in computing power, um, things like the massive increase in comms capabilities, advanced and additive manufacturing, are, are really bringing down the barriers to entry in this field, and it's driving just incredible innovation. And it's happening at startups, but it's also happening at Lockheed Martin. You might not realize this, but Lockheed Martin, working with Stanford, actually built the first CubeSat, uh, that was launched, uh, here out of the US, um, that was called, uh, QuakeSat, and we did that with Stellar Solutions. Uh, this was right around, uh, just after 2000, I guess. And so we've been in that, you know, from the very beginning. And, uh, you know, I, I, I talked about some of these, like, you know, Maia and Orion, but you know, we're in the middle of, uh, what we call smart sats and software-defined satellites that can essentially restructure and remap their, uh, purpose, their mission on orbit to give you almost a, you know, unlimited flexibility for these satellites over their lifetimes. So, uh, those are just a couple of examples, but yeah, this, this is a great time to be in space.

   26. LFLex Fridman1:10:13

       Absolutely. So Wright brothers flew for the first time 116 years ago. Uh, so now we have supersonic stealth planes and all the technology we've talked about. What innovations... Obviously you can't predict the future, but do you see Lockheed in the next 100 years? If you take that same leap, m- th- how will the world of technology and engineering change? I know it's an impossible question, but, uh, nobody could have predicted that we could even fly 120 years ago. So what do you think is the edge of possibility that we're going to be exploring in the next 100 years?

   27. KJKeoki Jackson1:10:52

       Yeah. I, I don't know that there is an edge. Um, I, you know, we've been around for almost that entire time, right? Uh, you know, uh, the Lockheed brothers and, uh, Glenn L. Martin starting their companies, you know, in the basement of a church, in a old, uh, you know, service station. Uh, we're very different companies today than we were back then, right? And that's because we've continuously reinvented ourselves over the... all, all of those decades. I think it's fair to say, yeah, I know this for sure, the world of the future, it's gonna move faster, it's gonna be more connected, it's gonna be more autonomous, and, uh, it's gonna be more (laughs) complex than it is today. And so, this is the world, you know, as a CTO at Lockheed Martin, that I think about, what are the technologies that we have to invest in? Whether it's things like AI and autonomy, you know, you can think about quantum computing, which is an area that we've invested in to try to stay ahead of these technological changes, and frankly, some of the threats that are out there. I b- I believe that we're gonna be out there in the solar system, that we're gonna be defending, and defending well, against probably, you know, military threats that nobody has even thought about today. Uh, we are going to be... m- we're gonna use these capabilities to have far greater knowledge of our own planet, the depths of the oceans, you know, all the way to the, uh, upper reaches of the atmosphere, and everything out to the sun and to the edge of the solar system. So, uh, so that's what I look forward to. Um, and I, uh, I'm excited, I mean, just looking ahead in the next decade or so to the steps that I see ahead of us, uh, in that time.

   28. LFLex Fridman1:12:36

       I don't think there's a better place to end. Okay, okay, thank you so much.

   29. KJKeoki Jackson1:12:39

       Lex, it's been a real pleasure, and, uh, sorry it took so long to get up here, but I'm glad we were able to make it happen.

   30. LFLex Fridman1:12:45

       I'm glad we were able to make it happen.

Episode duration: 1:13:05