The last human in the loop is a signature
Most automation programmes stop at the same place, and it is not a technical boundary. Somebody has to be accountable, and accountability needs a person.
- automation
- accountability
- approval
Blog
Notes from a research programme on the autonomous enterprise: why the last human in the loop is a signature, and what stops a machine owning anything.
Self-healing is not a feature, it is a different architecture
Bolting recovery onto a system that was designed to be repaired by people produces automation that fails in more interesting ways, not fewer.
- self-healing
- reliability
- control loops
Can a machine own anything?
Legal personhood for autonomous systems gets discussed as though it were arriving. It is not, and the reasons are more interesting than the proposals.
- legal personhood
- liability
- regulation
An autonomous system needs an off switch it cannot reach
The interesting property of a stop is not that it exists. It is that the thing being stopped has no path to observe, delay or depend on it.
- kill switch
- safety
- supervision
Why we call it an organism, and what that does not mean
Biological language is useful for describing closed loops and self-repair, and it is the fastest route to claims nobody can support. Both are worth saying.
- terminology
- cybernetics
- claims