Tag Archive: Systems


Systemic Considerations For The Future of Technology – Artificial Intelligence

Filed under: Systems Theory by systemsprinciples — Leave a comment
3 July , 2012

Most futurist experts believe that Artificial Intelligence (AI) is going to play a key role in the development of technology. Some of those believe that AI will ultimately provide the quickest route to a ‘technological singularity’, past which no further technological innovation will be possible. This article will use the rich picture we have built, as well as some of the considerations we have made in previous articles, to assess the possibilities for the future of AI.

AI in virtual personalities

We’ve asserted previously that virtual personalities enable users to interact in a contented manner with multi-function devices. Critical to the development of virtual personalities is the evolution of AI. To accurately simulate anthropic entities, these virtual personalities require a degree of autonomy similar to human personalities. That is, if asked a question, the virtual personality must be at least capable of replying in a similar variety of ways.

This is a trickier problem than it might seem. Though most questions asked of people are guided in to restrictive ‘answering frames’ that limit the number of possible responses by individual’s emotional reference points, the nature of selecting the right ‘frame’ is complicated. So, AI must be developed not only as a logical engine running a program to discriminate human from non-human responses – the quickest route to effective AI seems to be in simulating the human brain itself.

Futurist Ray Kurzweil believes this will be achieved by 2020. That’s eight years’ time. At that point, what can we expect?

Individual AIs 

As we discussed in the previous article, companies will need to develop ‘avatar personalities’ that represent the characteristics of their corporate ethos. In doing this, then, they will need to really get to grips with the human psychology behind developing ‘human’ AIs. So, I anticipate a boom in research fields around neuroscience, cognitive psychology and, eventually, ‘machine psychology’ – the art of coding the human brain in to a logical device. Through careful study, corporate entities will be able to create machine personalities that are representative of their defining characteristics. Governmental entities may also pursue this line of thinking, but (as evidenced historically) on a slightly less progressive timeline.

Cross-communication 

Recall that consumers are, in general, driving towards a single unified ecosystem of content and procedures. This is mirrored in various global drives for integration and ‘end-to-end’ control.  A company that produces its own printer now make its own paper. It’s possible to run your whole life using only products and services from Virgin.

What does this mean for the development of AIs? There are two clear paths here: a singular common ecosystem is established before the development of ‘human-level’ AI, or a singular common ecosystem is not established at all. In the second case, one could imagine cross-compatibility to be of little relevance: any cross-functionality will be achieved via interactions of high-level AI, consolidating the need for various communication frameworks in a common, natural, language. The first case is, to my mind, less likely (given the timescales involved). We have seen that there are multiple large entities pursuing the R&D dream – and all are succeeding to various extents. Market competition prevents them from collapsing together to form a single entity, and patent protection prevents their innovation from following identical lines. So, it is this author’s belief that the future is one of multifarious and multipersonalitied AIs communicating via a common, natural, language. At that point, I suspect the distinction between ‘real’ and ‘virtual’ personalities to be much, much less of an issue.

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Systemic Considerations For The Development Of Technology – Virtual Personalities

Filed under: Systems Theory by systemsprinciples — Leave a comment
3 July , 2012

In the previous article I expanded on the importance of minimising the interference of hardware or software in the connection between user and end-goal. However, this is only part of the story: some technology companies are moving in a fundamentally different direction. Given that our sense of self-soothing is built best when socially interacting within a shared cultural group, some companies are moving towards developing virtual personalities into their hardware. The point? To simulate interaction with individuals we can feel an affinity with and, in doing so, stimulate our feelings of self-soothing, contentment and, as such, brand loyalty.

Conversations with hardware

Do you talk to your phone? Regularly converse with the all in one printers at work? It’s pretty natural behaviour – and tech companies are trying to encourage it.

Moving to a different brand of phone involves more than just learning a new skill-set: hardware takes on its own personality, and in changing we must adapt to a new ‘virtual person’. Part of this is fuelled by the purposeful anachronisms built in to modern devices. Still more is fuelled by a well-crafted approach to designing and manufacturing them. But companies also take particular approaches that give a sense of ‘system-wide’ – or ‘ecosystem-wide’ – unity to their virtual personalities.

Take, for example, Siri on newer Apple devices. S/he (depending on region) responds in a characteristically personable manner – and Apple admits to having spent many hours carefully crafting a personality that would tread the line between servile and expertise. As such, Siri’s responses are in keeping with the entire iPhone, iOS and even Apple ecosystems. Her wit is akin to that shared by Apple’s marketing department. The kinds of responses she gives to more philosophical questions are in keeping with Apple’s guiding principles. What’s the point of all this? Because, each time you use Siri, you engage in a shared cultural experience with someone your body recognises as a genuine individual. Result? Endorphins. Particularly as Siri is polite, complimentary but self-confident – exactly the kind of individual we crave attention from.

Other technology companies are moving towards speech-recognition and synthesis software, but few currently have the ‘personality’ of Siri. And that’s quite a big issue. Given the psychological reaction we have to virtual personalities, I would predict that, over the next few years, competitors will develop their own characteristic variants.

Long-term thinking

 Researchers in AI have spoken at length about the ‘uncanny valley’ – a point past which computer-generated personalities will be indistinguishable from ‘natural’ ones. Some suggest that this is a point that humans will innately reject further AI development, but many are accepting that humans will likely welcome it warmly. Many science fiction writers have authored stories in which technology-kind is indistinguishable from humankind, and this seems to be a systemic trend in the complexity of technology evolution. So, in addition to the anachronising of common hardware and software tools – allowing us to accept them in to our consciousness – I believe that we will see an increasing trend in those ‘multi-function’ elements to become more ‘human’. In doing so, companies will not only enable swifter and more efficient features – they will build strong brand loyalty, based on direct interaction with a ‘representative avatar’ of the company ethos itself.

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Systemic Considerations For Future Technology – The App Mentality

Filed under: Systems Theory by systemsprinciples — Leave a comment
3 July , 2012

If you pop down to the local 99 cent store, you’ll see that it’s littered with multi-function tools; spanners that are hammers, screwdrivers that are wrenches. And, though many households might count such tools among their DIY arsenals, they’ve never really caught on in the intended way – as replacements for entire toolboxes. Why? Ultimately, the issue lies with an old adage – if you try to do too many things at one time, you will fail at all of them. It’s the same psychological inclination towards specialised tools that guides our selection of hardware and software – it’s a subtle trend, but one that will determine the success or failure of certain emerging technologies.

Hammers, spanners and Maps

Google Maps is a great invention. It’s an incredible piece of kit: you can navigate satellite imagery of virtually anywhere, and in many places you can take a trip curbside to see the surroundings in a glorious panorama.

It may come as a surprise, then, when I say that Google Maps’ browser integration is symptomatic of a trend away from multi-function software. It’s not great. In fact, it’s not a particularly pleasant experience. I probably wouldn’t spend hours enchanted by Google Maps in my browser window. Put it on a tablet, though – and all of a sudden it just clicks. That back-end code is just made for that kind of tailored interface. Why?

It comes down to anachronism, and how that stimulates our self-soothing system. We’ve mentioned earlier that well-designed things ‘feel’ right and hit our endorphin sweet spot. I’ve also alluded briefly to the role of designing digital interfaces as if they were analog – and these things are, I believe, closely linked. Consider the complexity systemically. Our human psychology demands well-crafted products, and most of our understanding of ‘well-crafted’ comes from products having a ‘human touch’ – handling a handwritten map will stimulate greater self-soothing than using one from a printer. Therefore, we will crave objects with a ‘human touch’, especially when these things are well-crafted. It’s therefore in the best interests of companies to design software and hardware that simulates anachronistic objects with a ‘human touch’. In turn, we relate handling of well-crafted anachronistic objects to our self-soothing, and reinforce our belief that such objects can provide contentment. The positive feedback loop is complete, and highly reinforceable – the more anachronistic and well-designed stuff we associate with contentment, the more we will seek it out.

So what does this mean for Google Maps? Simply that its design is necessarily a fine balance between features and anachronism. I prefer to use Maps on my tablet, because it feels more like an authentic map. I prefer to use it in the ‘roads only’ mode, because the satellite imagery disturbs my sense of anachronism. Sure, it’s fun to navigate the world via satellite imagery, but I’m more comfortable with something that resembles a map from the pre-digital age; I associate that with contentment and security.

The app mentality

 So this is where the ‘app’ mentality comes in. Consumers want tailored products that simulate anachronism – and browsers just cannot do that. They boast a great feature set, but like the multi-function tool it’s not all about the stuff it can do. Apps, on the other hand, offer a series of well-designed and carefully anachronised experiences, especially if they are being run on a flexible app platform. This in turn moves us to choose them, even at a premium (in both efficiency and cost). So, the future of technology development does not lie, I believe, in multi-function software (like browsers) – but in specialist apps.

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Systemic Considerations For the Future of Technology – The Role of Self-Soothing Systems

Filed under: Systems Theory by systemsprinciples — 5 Comments
28 June , 2012

Here we’ve broached an absolutely vast topic area – namely, how does the influence of culture play out in the development of technology? It’s a key question, but one that could vastly overinflate our rich picture. So, we’re going to assume that cultures and groups of individuals work in harmony with the tripartite model of mind we’ve looked at earlier.

In the last article, it was suggested that there’s a strong positive feedback triangle around the goal and threat systems of consumers and the aims of the marketing industry. Here, we’re going to look at a negative feedback influence in this – one that reduces the effectiveness of goal and threat. That’s the self-soothing loop, and you can see it at play in lots of things happening in industry today. I believe that the impact of self-soothing will most keenly be seen in user experience design (UX design), and that’s potentially a really positive thing for industry.

Addiction

The thing about the goal/threat system is that operating under them is pretty addictive. And the ultimate problem with addiction is that it winds up in pursuit of unachievable sensations – that’s the same for drugs and for World of Warcraft. So what holds us back?

The self-soothing system produces endorphins, which help us to feel calm, safe and content. And I see this at play every day with modern technology, more so (I believe) than in the past.

Have you ever owned a beautiful piece of technology? Why is it so covetous? Is Apple’s marketing really that much better than everyone else’s? Is a Jaguar just a better-curved Fiat? There’s more going on here – and I believe the self-soothing system is at work.

Our self-soothing system responds to positive human interaction – kindness and caring, affection. Critically, it doesn’t matter whether that’s towards or from an family member, friend, animal, car…if the sensations of kindness and caring are felt, endorphins are released and we feel satisfied with what we have. And that’s coming through in the increasingly important field of design phenomenology.

Companies are becoming increasingly aware that the goal/drive mentality is great for getting individuals kick-started, but it’s not overly-sustainable: glitzy effects and wondrous gizmos can be replicated by other companies, and activate that same system. What each company can uniquely do is seduce the user’s self-soothing system – by creating objects that the user will both experience as pleasurably ‘caring’ and, in reciprocation, care for. It’s completely correct to say that emptying out your oscilloscope and resistors from your toolbox, cleaning them and putting them back is genuinely therapeutic – your self-soothing system enjoys taking care of things and receiving reciprocal kindness. Companies are becoming increasingly aware that the more human kindness and effort they put in to a finished product, the greater loyalty they will built with consumers – trust, and so on.

That extends right to technical repair, where face-to-face customer communication is blowing the industry away, and to company promotions featuring their engineers – owning those kinds of technology is much more about connecting with humans than it is possessing a chunk of metal. That’s a trend I see continuing – whether it be beautifully anachronistic interface designs, screens with resolutions so high they seem much more personal – like a printed page – or services that genuinely do increase the human interaction element of assistive technology – activating the self-soothing system is something that can build serious brand loyalty. People will care more for well-made stuff, and caring for things releases endorphins, as well as feelings of attachment. So, there’s an important systemic consideration – humans will build loyalty to things that show them a bit of compassion.

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