Law of Increasing Intelligence of Technical
Systems
Navneet Bhushan
1B-401, Akme
Harmony,Sarjapur Outer Ring Road,
Bangalore 560037,
INDIA
Introduction
Despite its discovery by Darwin, 150
years back, acceptance of evolution by
natural selection as a possible model of explanation of progress of cosmos
is relatively a recent phenomenon. One of the earlier recognition of evolution
due to ingenuity of human mind reflected in the successful inventions described
in patents and technological knowledge was discovered and explained by the
Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ). This resulted in discovery of laws
of evolution of technical systems which became the basis of classical TRIZ. The
purpose of evolution of technical
systems was to achieve the “Ideal system”. Technical systems exist or are
created to perform a function. The ideal technical system describes the
fulfillment of the function with reduction in number of the elements of
technical system that actuates the function. TRIZ and its laws of evolution of
technical systems discovered in the era
of physical systems – the era of machines – explained the fulfillment of
function in an ideal way.
2. Three Eras – Machine, Information and Mind
From the era of machines – dominated
by automobile – which incidentally became the model for classical TRIZ – we are
rapidly moving in the era of information.
Our understanding of “information” – its nature and its deeper manifestations –
is increasing day by day. When we started investigating the applicability of
laws of system evolution as described by TRIZ in the current era of information, we realized that TRIZ, understandably missed the key
ingredient, i.e., information, embedded in modern technical systems.
We discovered that human beings by
collectively evolving their technical systems, are trying to make each
technical system as close to a human being as possible – or at least a model of
human being and its environment based on the current understanding of the world
(for example, understanding of laws of
physics and chemistry in making an automobile) and the current understanding
of the system called the human being. As man understands the world around it as
well as its body and its mind, it wants to create an “ideal man” or at least an
idealized human of all technical systems it is creating. This is an unexpected discovery and may take the readers used to
classical TRIZ, sometime to accept it.
2.1
STEMIC-TCP Model
We propose in this paper, technical
systems emerged due to increasing understanding of two key fundamentals of
universe and their interactions – these are Space-Time
and Energy-Mass (we call these two fundamentals as STEM). Every technical system in the physical era/machine era is a reflection
of organization and reorganization in higher and higher order structures of
mass-energy organized in space-time. We propose, based on our recent and
deeper understanding of “information”, that information itself is one of the
fundamentals just like space-time and mass-energy. We need to understand the
concept of ideal system in the light of this proposal of making information
itself as fundamental. This increases the complexity of technical systems,
however, with three fundamentals – space-time, energy-matter and information –
we get new lens to view the evolution of technical systems.First fundamental is Space-Time which integrates space and time.
Space and time were considered two separate fundamentals but modern physics
integrated them as space-time. Space and Time Make up the Physics of the Seen while Space-Time the physics of the
very tiny and very large. The second
fundamental is Energy-Matter. If one look at the world around us, the
universe itself, is an organization of Energy-Matter in Space-Time. The systems
thinkers have talked about Matter, Energy and Information. If we look at the
basic building blocks of universe we have Space and Time (Space-time), Energy
and Matter (Energy-Matter), and Information.
It is information that organizes matter and energy in Space-time. We call these
the STEMI. The STEMI can organize or change its organization on its own based
on principle of maximum entropy or can be
orchestrated by Thought and Consciousness, i.e., the Mind of the "Matter" - the artificial. The ability to
reorganize matter and energy in space-time using information is the ability of
the Man. This requires Thought and Consciousness. This is the fourth
fundamental which we call Mind. The
ability to create these changes in matter and energy to organize into
structures, we call, the Power. Hence the mind has Thoughts, Consciousness and
hence Power (the TCP). The orchestrated changes in STEMI and changes in TCP due
to observations from STEMI are driving the world towards increasing capability,
evolution and design.
At the basic level of this framework lies a conceptual construct
called a System. When we talk about
definition of a System - from fundamental principles point of view – a System
can be defined as a set of elements (Energy-Matter organized in Space-Time)
working together (exchanging energy and/or information) and with the
environment to achieve an objective or perform a function (create Change - in
matter, energy and information in space-time). When the system is
achieved/changed by thought and consciousness we make systems artificial. The ability to create and control CHANGE is
Power. We call this the STEMIC TCP Model. Hence we need to leverage the new
methods in the light of these four fundamentals.
2.2
Era of Information to Era of Mind
When we started embedding information
in the technical systems, the machine era gave way to information era. The more
we understand information and a related capability to process it, i.e., computing
– the more we are embedding it in the physical systems. In the era of
information, technical systems started
becoming “smart” and “brilliant” – the adjectives usually reserved for
predominantly human faculty, i.e., intelligence. Further, as we understand
and realize the era of information which emerged under the shadow of era of
machines – we need to see how the integration of third fundamental – that is information – to STEM making it STEMI –
is impacting the evolution of technical systems.
Information is rapidly becoming all
pervasive, all embedded, and all penetrated. We realize the ideal technical
system today, not only need to perform certain pre-defined functions, but also
process information for example, to choose the function it needs to perform at
a particular moment. In fact, system should behave as an information processing
system before they actually perform their physical functions in
reorganizing/manipulating STEM. The STEMI interactions in technical systems,
indeed has made the modern systems closer to human beings in their ability to
process information, to create, re-organize, self-organize into new structures,
control and manage precision of physical effects.
Further, we realize, since we have
what some observers describe as the law of accelerating future, the fourth
fundamental, i.e., mind, will be
integrated into technical systems sooner than later. Even though information
era is still continuing, with the STEMI integration, we have already started a
deeper quest into the emergent phenomenon of complexity called the mind. The
mind is now being thought of to be reflected in our future technical systems.
We believe, when we integrate the ability to process thoughts and in fact
create “inventive” technical systems, we will enter the era of Genius Systems.
In an influencing
work, “The singularity is near”, Ray Kurzweil, defined why some futurists
predict that non-biological intelligence will exceed biological intelligence by
2050 AD or so. We will enter the era of mind and beyond with Genius Systems giving way to Trans-Human Intelligence Systems (THIS).
In the era of mind, the ideality will be defined in creating “perfect ideas” by
the genius systems/trans-human intelligent systems – they may turn out to be
“inventive Mr. Spocks” or “uncontrolled Frankenstein’s”. It is also a question
for future, just as the key question to answer for us is why nature in its
evolution missed “the wheel” but did not miss “opposable thumb”.
The “natural selection” articulated
and sold incorrectly as “survival of the fittest” has created immense problems
in our history. Evolution, in fact, doesn’t support it. Nature prefers to
retain as much variety as possible. The evolution progresses by “elimination of
the weakest”. This is visible in evolution of technical systems as well.
Technical systems however, have been chosen/developed/progressed through
investment of immense material and intellectual resources of humanity. The
evolution of technical systems in the STEMI era – driven by faulty “survival of
the fittest” guidance, has created extreme competition in men, societies,
countries and civilizations to control evolution. Whether it was designed by
nature to speed-up evolution or was an innocent error of nature? The arguments can
be created with same passion and logic by the proponents of the counter model
to evolution, i.e., the intelligent design of the universe, vis-Ã -vis the
evolutionary model. Yet Genetic algorithms, cellular automata and game of life
in 1970s and 1990s showed us that “self-reproducing” systems are a reality and
we can discover the laws/principles underlying these systems. We need to reach
specific level of complexity to be able to “self-reproduce” besides achieving
other emergent properties of complex systems. The argument is strengthened by
the emergent of mind in due to complexity of brain.
3. Increasing Intelligence of Technical
Systems
Given our
understanding of the current information era and how technical systems are
evolving from their predominantly physical characteristics into information
enriched technical systems, we propose in this paper a new law – the law of increasing intelligence of
technical systems.
We are in the era of information today. This is an era that has
replaced the era of machines that started with industrial revolution. This era
of information is giving us systems that are becoming increasingly intelligent. From the dumb systems that were responding to
inputs to perform specific functions, we have evolved to guided systems and smart
systems of the information era. The next stage of evolution of technical
systems is increasingly becoming clear as we are seeing emergence of brilliant systems which we predict will
become genius systems. By 2050 AD,
the world will have technical systems with more intelligence than biological
intelligence – predicted as the Singularity.
From information era we are now entering rapidly into the era of mind. This we
call as law of increasing intelligence of
technical systems.
In
the current Information Era, TRIZ needs to update its definition of a technical
system to include “information”. The goal of system evolution should be to
create ideal systems that attain perfect information to actualize the
underlying system functions.
In
the emerging era of Mind, TRIZ should be about ideas and thoughts. How can any
technical system process and actuate ideas? The ideal technical system will be
able to generate and actuate perfect ideas to attain system functions needed in
real time or even ahead of time.
4. Further Work
In this paper, we have proposed a new
law of evolution of technical systems. We call this the Law of Increasing
Intelligence of Technical systems. We further propose that TRIZ should
incorporate this new law to the existing laws of evolution of technical systems
as the current information era and future mind era of technical systems will
require new ways and concepts to invent systems that current have the new
fundamental of information and in future will have the fourth fundamental we
call the mind as their most prominent components. This is an initial concept
paper and we look forward to developing these initial concepts to solve new and
emerging problems and also expand TRIZ for the new world.
About the Author
Navneet Bhushan (Navneet) is a
founder director of CRAFITTI CONSULTING (www.crafitti.com) – an innovation consulting and research firm focused on
co-crafting innovation in global enterprises. He is the principal author of
Strategic Decision Making- Applying the Analytic Hierarchy Process published by
Springer-Verlag, UK, as part of the Decision Engineering Series. Navneet Blogs
at http://innovationcrafting.blogspot.com.
He can be contacted at navneet(dot)bhushan(at)
crafitti(dot)com. Currently he is working on his new book titled Crafting New
Choices.
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