Reflection: 20yrs since 9/11 – Philosophy & Defence
On 9/11, I was driving to work at a Defence site in Canberra, Australia, when I heard the news on the radio. My job was ‘technical writer and project administrator’ for Accenture supporting the Royal Australian Air Force Computerised Air Maintenance Manual 2 upgrade.
I remember new security guards posted at the site (and I wondered why our defence force had to hire civilian security guards!). All the blinds were drawn. Everyone on site was getting audited. Our security setting moved down from ‘Weathercock Green’ to ‘Weathercock Amber’. Was it possible that Australian cities could be hit? It didn’t seem likely, but *something* seemed likely… war had begun.
My dad and step-mum were in Manhattan and I got permission to call international on the office phone. My dad picked up from the upper east side and was remarkably rational about it; and didn’t feel threatened or worried. Even though his wife was missing!!! Which is to say, she had gotten on the cross-town bus to go to work, around 79th, and then mobile phone congestion made it hard for her to contact my dad. I believe it took her ten hours (?) to get home, in the chaos in the streets, maybe walking a long way back?
My brother Saul Devitt was living in an apartment in Maryland, too close to the Pentagon! (Even though it was a long drive around the Beltway to get there).
But thankfully my dad, brother and step-mum were all rattled, but ok.
Our base had responsibility for ensuring the F-18s deployed to support the US in Afghanistan in the subsequent week, could fly. At one point a screwdriver was misplaced and a plane couldn’t go anywhere until the screwdriver was located and hung up on the tool board with the orange tape around its shadow.
9/11 galvanised within me a desire to ‘do something with my life’ post my bachelors degree, beyond the typical work conversations about buying a Subaru Outback, renting Buffy the Vampire Slayer from Blockbuster and getting a mortgage.
By December 2001 I had applied to graduate school in the US to do a philosophy PhD. I wanted to get into Rutgers, which had the best cognitive science program in the world, and Jerry Fodor! Also, Rutgers was in New Jersey, pretty close to Manhattan and my family.
I felt that World War III was commencing and I didn’t know if I’d be able to see my family again if I didn’t get over there quick smart…. What else had the terrorists planned? How strong and big was their will? Strategically the US could not remain inert. So Afghanistan and Iraq both felt inevitable, regardless of evidence or no evidence of weapons of mass destruction.
I received my acceptance offer to Rutgers around April 2002 and by September 11 2002, I was living in New Jersey, unpacking my camp bed on the floor in my grad school house. My partner was a million miles away in Vancouver, having taken a job at Relic to make Homeworld 2. We had a long-distance relationship for 4yrs.
17yrs, a hand fasting, a marriage, and two kids and a few jobs later, I applied for a job in Defence Science & Technology Group as a ‘social and ethical robotics researcher – my dream job’. I was so proud to get the job. I liked the feeling of having a mission. I liked being within Defence rather than a contractor outside of Defence. I liked getting off the causal Academic merry-go-round.
From there I became Chief Scientist of Trusted Autonomous Systems, a Defence Cooperative Research Centre.
Working for Defence and for Australia means a lot to me. I like to feel that I am doing something for a bigger purpose.
So, 9/11, everything changed for me.
