What do these 24 big brains have in common?: Answer at the bottom

Brad Allenby, President’s Professor of Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering, and Law at Arizona State University and founding chair of the Consortium for Emerging Technologies, Military Operations, and National Security

Peter Bergen, Co-Director of the Future of War project, Vice President at New America and Professor of Practice at Arizona State University, the author of best-selling books about al-Qaeda, including Manhunt: The Ten Year Search for Bin Laden from 9/11 to Abbottabad

Rosa Brooks, Professor at Georgetown University School of Law, former Counselor to the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy

Sharon Burke, former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Operational Energy and former Vice President and Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security

Linell Cady, Professor of Religious Studies and founding Director of the Center for the Study of Religion and Conflict at Arizona State University

Sue Clark Johnson, Professor of Practice, Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication and former director of the Morrison Institute for Public Policy at Arizona State University

Alan Davidson, New America’s Vice President for Technology Policy and Strategy and Director of the Open Technology Institute, former Director of Public Policy for Google in the Americas

Werner J.A. Dahm, Foundation Professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering, Founding Director and Chief Scientist, Security and Defense Systems Initiative at Arizona State University, former Chief Scientist of the U.S. Air Force

Lt. Gen. (ret.) Benjamin C. Freakley, Professor of Practice of Leadership at Arizona State University, senior advisor at the McCain Institute for International Leadership

Shane Harris, Senior Writer at Foreign Policy magazine and the author of the forthcoming @War: The Rise of the Military-Internet Complex and The Watchers: The Rise of America’s Surveillance State

David Kilcullen, Senior Fellow at New America and former Special Advisor to the Secretary of State from 2007-2009, Senior Advisor to General David Petraeus in Iraq in 2007, the author of Accidental Guerrilla, Counterinsurgency, and Out of the Mountains: The Coming Age of the Urban Guerrilla

Orde Kittrie, Professor of Law, Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, Arizona State University, former U.S. Department of State official, expert on weapons of mass destruction and lawfare

Michael Lind, co-founder of New America, former editor/staff writer for The New Yorker, Harper’s, and The National Interest, author of multiple books including The American Way of Strategy

Tim Maurer, Research Fellow at New America, focusing on cybersecurity, cyberwar and internet security and freedom with publications in Foreign Policy, CNN, and Slate

Sascha Meinrath, founder of New America’s Open Technology Institute and Director of X-Lab, in 2013 named to the “TIME Tech 40: The Most Influential Minds in Tech”

Doug Ollivant, former Director, National Security Council, former counterinsurgency advisor in Afghanistan, and leader of the team that wrote the 2006-7 Baghdad “surge” plan

Jason Roberts, Lincoln Chair in Ethics, Director of the Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics, and Dean’s Distinguished Professor in the Life Sciences at Arizona State University

Daniel Rothenberg, Co-Director of the Future of War Project, Future of War Fellow at New America, Professor of Practice at Arizona State University, and Co-Editor of Drone Wars

Peter W. Singer, Strategist and Senior Fellow at New America, named one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers by Foreign Policy magazine, author of Corporate Warriors, Children at War and Wired for War

Daniel Sarewitz, Professor of Science and Society, School of Life Sciences and Co-Director, Consortium for Science, Policy, and Outcomes at Arizona State University

Anne-Marie Slaughter, President and CEO of New America, former Dean of the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University, former head of Policy Planning for the U.S. State Department, and author and editor of six books including A New World Order. 

Cameron Thies, Professor and Director of the School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University

Mark von Hagen, Professor of History and Director of the Office of Veteran and Military Academic Engagement at Arizona State University

The answer: They are all my mateys in the New America Future of War project. More to come.