New « Intelligence » Coming to the Cockpit…Again?

Abstract

Adaptive automation/agent has been “a good idea” for 40 years now. Yet it’s hardly used so far. Automations changing in accordance to internal rules are widely distributed and eventually fail to be understandable whenever their inner change can’t be grasped by the operator supposedly “trained & in charge”. All that could change because for technological reasons AI is back with the assumption is that it will fix it all. How can we build cooperative agents capable of helping Humans by building them with a techno-centered view? The epic fail of Ai in the 90’ will just repeat itself. We need to analyze the root of our need when envisioning cooperation with agents. So, what is it that we want from adaptive agents? If you take the example of an assistant surgeon, you have your answer, we want that kind of adaptation. They facilitate the surgeon work without any (verbal) exchanges (not resource demanding to control). They know what to do and when to help. They can interpret any sign from the surgeon as a directive for help. They completely share the same references. They know so well the implicit that collective work seems like the work of a single entity. Alas that is the description of a human being. So definitely what we seek in a cooperative agent are qualities reserved to the living like the ability to adapt. We have misplaced assumptions of humanity on AI without giving it the potential for it: socializing for cooperation through proper communication. It’s called articulation work and it’s been around 30 years at least. It’s the key to enable effective cooperation between agents. DARPA has just realized it and has launched in 2017 a massive research project so as to use AI to digitize the interaction level between an agent and an operator. Modeling with AI what makes a proper cooperation between agents and Human could be the answer.