robison@eosp1.UUCP (Tobias D. Robison) (03/21/84)
References: I think it is hopeless to demand that the algorithms instanced by expert systems be well understood so they can be questioned. Even when the algorithms can easily be printed, they will be hard for any human being to comprehend, except in the most trivial systems. Expert systems attempt to imitate one kind of human thinking, in which what we call "judgment" plays a part. I expect that as expert systems become more sophisticated, they will become harder and harder to judge, just as the think-work of human beings is hard to judge for quality. True "artificial intelligence" systems will have these problems in spades. Please note that we have already reached the point where ordinary procedural softwqare is hard to judge. It's quite common to spend 18 months shaking down a moderate sized piece of software. - Toby Robison allegra!eosp1!robison decvax!ittvax!eosp1!robison princeton!eosp1!robison