Off Script: A Cosmonaut's Experience in the Age of AI

A crisis rarely arrives at full force—it builds, and at some point it turns into a state of complete uncertainty, where there is neither a map nor a precedent. Space is an environment in which crises and unpredictable situations are not an abstraction but part of the profession. That is exactly why human spaceflight pays so much attention to how a person perceives a threat, makes decisions and stays effective—when everything goes off plan.

Today business operates in an environment where the pace of change is comparable to the dynamics of spaceflight. Technology, markets, geopolitics—everything is changing faster than strategies can be updated. Artificial intelligence deserves separate attention: a technology that does not merely change individual industries but is itself the accelerator of every other change. The ability to act in a crisis and the ability to find your bearings in complete uncertainty are different skills, and both are necessary.

Three blocks, three layers. First—how perception works in extreme conditions and why we see a situation as worse than it is. Then—what actually works when a crisis could have been foreseen. And finally—how to make decisions where there is no map at all: when you hit a wall or find yourself in complete uncertainty. Including through an unexpected analogy with the way artificial intelligence works. All of it through real stories from spaceflights and from training for them.

Storytelling: the problem—a story from practice, my own or my colleagues’—analysis—conclusion. A presentation with photos and video, and dialogue with the audience.

The lecture “Off Script: A Cosmonaut’s Experience in the Age of AI” will be of interest to:

1. managers and specialists who work amid instability and rapid change;
2. teams that regularly face non-standard tasks;
3. anyone interested in how people perceive a crisis and make decisions where there is no ready-made script.

The lecture will be of particular interest to those looking for an unconventional take on AI—neither technical nor futurological, but human: what the decisions of an experienced professional have in common with the way artificial intelligence works.

1. In a crisis a person is stronger than they think, but weaker than in an ordinary situation: the physical reality of a threat and the psychological reality of perception are two different worlds.
2. The first response to a crisis has to be simple and drilled to the point of automatism; complex strategies come after the situation has been stabilized.
3. Preparation for a crisis begins long before it and is built with a margin: what you know on the ground at an A, in space you know at a C at best.
4. In a fast-changing world risky decisions are not the exception but a necessity; they rest on a deep knowledge of your own field, which suggests a workable option where there are no rules yet.
5. Hit a wall—look for an unconventional way through; the key to it is the right question: not “how do we do it the old way?” but “what else could solve the problem?”
6. A crisis does not make you stronger by itself, but only when a lesson has been drawn from it—even from a crisis you failed to overcome.
7. The team is the main resource both in a manageable crisis and in complete uncertainty: no one flies into the unknown alone.

INTRODUCTION:

Where the title comes from: pilot-cosmonaut Vladimir Lyakhov’s saying “Everything will go off script” and its confirmation on every flight (the red protective caps on the equipment taken outside the station: they could be removed only at the hatch).

Context: from the pandemic to permanent turbulence. Exponential rates of change—a timeline from the origin of life to the fourth technological revolution. Artificial intelligence as the key accelerator of that change. Conclusion: uncertainty is not a temporary phenomenon but the new permanent reality.

BLOCK 1. PERCEPTION IN CRISIS AND UNCERTAINTY

How a person perceives a threat and why that perception systematically distorts reality. Four mechanisms:

1. overestimating the threat and underestimating your own resources;
2. tunnel vision;
3. a drop in the quality of actions under stress;
4. the vulnerability of the lone individual: stress hits harder when you are alone than in a well-coordinated group.

Each mechanism is unpacked through a story from space practice.

BLOCK 2. A STRATEGY FOR GETTING THROUGH A CRISIS

How to act when the scenario could have been foreseen. Four principles:

1. prepare before the crisis arrives, with a margin above the obvious norm (the protective caps—checks before the point of no return; so many questions to the specialists that “he must have been really worried”);
2. the first response—simple algorithms drilled to automatism (Warn – Gather – Work: warn the crew, gather at the designated place, work by the procedure);
3. deliberately widen your field of view and draw on the knowledge of the whole team—on board and on the ground;
4. draw from every crisis a resource for the next level of readiness.

BLOCK 3. A BREAKTHROUGH STRATEGY: THE UNKNOWN OR A WALL

How to act when the scenario cannot be foreseen. Three principles:

1. accepting risk—how to choose the best available option with incomplete data (an analogy with AI: a model does not store ready-made answers but builds an answer from patterns learned from a multitude of examples—in the same way a professional recognizes the familiar in a new situation);
2. finding unconventional solutions by widening your field of view, including into neighboring fields, and by knowing how to ask the right questions;
3. the team as the only way to make up for what you cannot know in advance (from my experience of working in open space).

CONCLUSION

The three hardiness attitudes described by Salvatore Maddi as the scientific framework for the lecture’s conclusions: control—the conviction that your actions affect the outcome: a sober assessment of the threat, preparation, simple algorithms; commitment—staying engaged in the work and not being left alone; accepting risk—making decisions on incomplete data and learning a lesson from any outcome.

1. see how the psychological mechanisms of perception work in a crisis—through experience where the price of a mistake was as high as it gets;
2. see, through the lens of space practice, how preparation for crisis situations is built and what in it actually works;
3. compare familiar principles for acting in uncertainty with the way the same questions were resolved in extreme conditions;
4. see the role of the team in a new context—where survival depended on the quality of interaction;
5. look at risky decision-making through an analogy with AI—and rethink your own approach to decisions in conditions where there is no algorithm.

60–90 minutes, including Q&A.