Human element is a vital cog in maritime safety ecosystem:
https://safetyatsea.net/opinion/opinion-commentary/2019/a-vital-cog-in-the-safety-ecosystem/?utm_campaign=CL_SAS_Newswire1_20190924_SAS_e-production_E-45048_GT_0924_0400&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua
While technology take over more and more of the decision making it may be time to share the burden of responsibility of command between the Master and … WHO?
The question may not be who shares the burden of command, but how human judgment is preserved as autonomy assumes more operational decisions.
DoD 3000.09 requires “appropriate levels of human judgment,” yet we still lack an operational framework for defining, engineering, and evaluating what that means in practice. Accountability cannot simply migrate between people or systems—it must be anchored to the conditions that enable trustworthy human judgment under uncertainty.
Mission owners aren’t just responsible for delivering capabilities; they’re responsible for preserving the decision space that allows commanders to exercise sound judgment when it matters most. In that sense, preserving human judgment is itself an operational capability—one that deserves the same rigor as safety, resilience, and mission assurance.
IMO: as long as questions like these are phrased by academics, using jargon and buzzwords common only to academics, most sailors will ignore the question.
I think you are correct. In all industries smart, competent college educated outsiders are brought in to improve safety, workflow, whatever. But, the one thing they aren’t tough is how to talk the talk. I was a union bricklayer for years. We had our own vernacular. If some dude came talking about rows of bricks instead of courses like we would say, he was immediately ignored.
The other question is… What? I’ve got two degrees and I’m still not sure what you’re trying to say here lol. Or, ask here? Is this related to ships or sailors?
It’s about the lack of a model or framework. Mica Endsley come to mind. From Wikipedia:
Endsley has authored over 200 scientific articles and reports on situation awareness,[3][4] decision making and automation and is recognized internationally for her pioneering work in the design, development and evaluation of systems to support human situation awareness and decision-making, based on her model of situation awareness. This human-centered design approach, it’s being said that has been found to be critical to successfully integrating people with advanced technologies and automation in a wide variety of domains.
Endsely’s model has been found useful but in the case of integration with AI @Sara_Morrissey is basically saying " we still lack an operational framework"
The ARPA trial maneuver function might be a good candidate for adding AI capabilities. Might look similar to how Google maps (or shipboard weather routing software) generates the fastest route.
If AI generated avoidance courses based on required CPA / TCPA and COLREGS and so forth (delivering capabilities).how would that work wrt the interface (the decision space?) between AI and officer of the watch?
successful navigation depends first on orientation. Decisions improve only when people accurately understand where they are, what is changing, and what matters most.
Across every domain, the same principle emerged: the quality of decisions is constrained by the quality of orientation.
the quality of decisions is constrained by the quality of orientation, In the OODA loop observation and orientation are linked, what is observed depends upon orientation. Both a skilled, experienced mariner and a green officer may both see the same scene but will observe different elements of that scene.
