Sandhurst - Reflections

Kieran Knowles shares some reflections from our Sandhurst residential.

As we sat in the main hall of Sandhurst's Old College, the mid-afternoon sun pouring through the large elaborate stained-glass window casting colourful dappled spots onto the PowerPoint screen which read ‘Responsible AI Implementation’ I was reminded of something Ruth Turner had said in one of our meetings as I was trying to figure out what the Forward Institute was.

“The place we’re in should be important, it should mean something.”

I’d never been to Sandhurst. In fact, I’d never been to a military base of any sort. 

It’s grand. Of course it is.

It feels like a university campus, you can sense the history. It’s in the pillars, the steps, the parade grounds, the statues, the trees, the lakes. It’s everywhere. Outside its like a country park, inside, its large stone tiles or rich red patterned carpets, intricate oil paintings, armour, flags, pageantry. It’s everything I imagined it would be.

On my walk in I could hear the distant pops of gunfire, on my way out there was a squadron of cadets collectively carrying a log and shouting encouragements to each other. There were horses, and squirrels - everywhere. Herons. I even saw a toadstool as red as any you see on the front cover of fairytales.

And there we were, in a large, acoustically difficult hall, discussing (with the aid of the brilliant Somayeh Aghnia FBCS) the existential, exciting and life altering developments in AI.

The place we were was important.

Where tradition meets innovation. The old and the new. The stained glass, the PowerPoint. The carefully crafted oil paintings, depicting wars or Generals, victories, defeats. 

Art, which had cost the makers so much, had demanded more, painstakingly detailed. Each brushstroke a reminder of the individuality and humanity that made it. And a PowerPoint demonstrating the flippant competence of synthetic creativity.

The place we are.

Caught, between a world we understand and one that is changing in front of our eyes. The future of work seems a million miles away from the hallowed halls of great institutions, of tradition and grandeur. But here we are. In a place that has survived. Endured. We rely on the familiar to give us our bearings, to give us direction, if we know where we start we can imagine where we might be going.

So, we were there, this week, for a little while.

Leaders of old adorning the walls. While our fellows, our leaders, sat beneath asking question about the shape and challenges of the modern world. They weren’t wearing robes, or garments, wielding swords, or pistols, but they’re facing into issues those depicted in the paintings could never have contemplated or imagined.

We are here. Imagining what comes next.

Written by Kieran Knowles