Screw fancy space shields and arming satellites. The U.S. Army has better plans for the future of war – elaborate AI constructs. Even better, your favorite MMOs like World of Warcraft, Maple Story, or Everquest could be part of the testing grounds for these constructs.

The U.S. Army’s director of research and laboratory management, John Parmentola, recently told military technology blog DoD Buzz that the military isn’t just looking for a few good bombs to invent. Instead, they’re looking to create holograms with a brain that (presumably) could kill a person. But before blood starts flying, one has to test the construct. According to Palermo, that place is an MMO:

We want to use the massively multiplayer online game as an experimental laboratory to see if they’re good enough to convince humans that they’re actually human.

I honestly can’t think of a better place to test the A.I. for “quantum ghost imaging,” which is the crazy Star Trek terminology for the hologram projection part of the technology. I bet the A.I. would learn more about the pitfalls of mankind and subsequently why it needs to defeat the human race quicker than any other real world experience could possibly provide.

[via ShackNews]