Welcome to the Cognitive Cybernetics Laboratory (CCL)
© 2003-2004 ScottCarpenter@eden-corp.com | BIO | Updated 28-Sep-04

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TASK SCHEDULE:
DOC TYPE DOC DATE DOC VERSION DOC TITLE DOC STATUS
IDEA PAPER 22-AUG-03 1.0.0 Cognitive Cybernetic Model for Design of Complex Adaptive Systems REJECTED
IDEA PAPER 24-FEB-04 2.0.0 Investigation of Methods that Promote Knowledge Discovery in Models of Complex Systems APPROVED
PUBLICATION 11-JUL-04 1.0.0 Carpenter, S. A. and Cannady, J. (2004). Tool for Sharing and Assessing Models of Fusion-Based Space Transportation Systems Proceedings of the 40th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, July 11-14, Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
DISSERTATION-RELATED TOPICS:
* human-cognitive model (called the vision-hierarchy model)
* human-machine model (called the cognitive-cybernetic model)
* developed a complex interdisciplinary system (called the Testbed)
* discovered new understanding about nuclear fusion power plants
PUBLISHED
PDP * 27-JUN-04 1.0.0 Investigation of Methods that Promote Knowledge Discovery in Models of Complex Systems REJECTED
PDP * 28-Sep-04 2.0.0 Assessing Emergent Understanding of a Complex System using the Cognitive-Cybernetic Approach UNDER REVIEW
FDP ** DOC DATE DOC VERSION DOC TITLE DOC STATUS
DISSERTATION DOC DATE DOC VERSION DOC TITLE DOC STATUS
* PDP = Preliminary Dissertation Proposal, ** FDP = Formal Dissertation Proposal

  • Publish Fusion Papers

  • Publish Cognitive Cybernetic Model Papers and Book

  • Publish Enterprise Wisdom Management Papers and Book

  • Publish Space Fusion Power Book

  • Publish Designing Complex Systems

  • Publish Chinese Reading and Writing Book


  • PROGRAMMATICS:


    SUPPORTING CONCEPTS:

    RESEARCH AREAS

    Cognitive Rationale:
    • Layered-Understanding ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Describes a model of how humans come to understand things. SIGNIFICANCE: Provides a human cognitive model to guide the design of a decision support system. TOPICS: Literature review. Creates a theory of "Context-Understanding" that operates on five levels: index-data, rule-information, model-knowledge, goal-wisdom, and mission-vision. Compares and contrasts characteristics of human understanding: context-vs-emptiness, order-vs-chaos, understanding-vs-mystery, complexity-vs-simplicity. Discusses "relativity of context" and how that affects thinking and communication between people. Compares related terminology for business, science and engineering, and lay person. Discusses the mental energy, time committments, and practicalities required for context-down vs context-up education.
    • Evolution of Cognitive Cybernetics ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Describes how machine systems are evolving to enhance natural human cognitive processes, to may make tractable future memory management, maintenance, and integrated expansion of the world's understanding (data, information, knowledge, wisdom, and vision). SIGNIFICANCE: Provides a machine model that makes all "context" available to every person with access to the system (Internet), which enables "context-down learning". TOPICS: Reviews the literature and discusses the development of existing machine systems (data bases, information bases, knowledge bases, and wisdom bases). Considers the strengths and weaknesses of human cognition, and those that can be extended by machine systems (cognitive cybernetics). Develops the important concept of integrated layers of understanding embedded in machine systems. Concludes by considering the value of context-down education.
      • Cybernetic Epistemology ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Describes how humans can "understand" in the first place, calling genetic "context" (aka instinct and genetic memory). These genetic contexts can be extended by cybernetic technology (cognitive cybernetics). SIGNIFICANCE: Academic only, for consistency, and to solve the debate between Foundationalism and Hermeneutics. TOPICS: Literature review. Discusses the structure of evolved genetic "context", the structure of cognitive-cybernetic vision support systems, and the properties (such as duration of incremental change) for (1) genetic learning, (2) experiential learning, (3) apprentice learning, and (4) context-down learning.
      • Context-Down Learning ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Develops the model of "Context-Down Learning". SIGNIFICANCE: Human cognitive energies are utilized at a high level of understanding. Human learning is facilitated by learning "down hill". Time, energy and cost are spared. High-level machine systems (knowledge and wisdom management systems) are important to the bottom line for elite enterprises, and these systems influence the culture and performance of the workforce. TOPICS: Literature review. Compares and contrasts the differences between context-down and context-up learning with respect to cost, time, and cognitive and enterprise energy. Provides several examples of context-down and context-up learning. Develops the concepts of scalar, trend, and domain thinking and communitcating. Emphasizes that machine systems carry context, and that human understanding quicly follows. "Where there is context, understanding is soon to follow."
      • Wisdom Discovery ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Develops a human-cognitive procedure for discovering wisdom. SIGNIFICANCE: Identifies wisdom that leads to deeper understanding, optimized solutions to goals, and discovery of underlying meaning that guides further learning. TOPICS: Literature review. Within the cognitive-cybernetic layered-understanding framework, describes the procedure for identifying, gathering cognitive resources, modeling, valuing (trend thinking), and consolidating new understanding (domain thinking) into wisdom (decision principles). Provides a real-life example of a space-based transportation system optimization.
      • Measuring the Memory of Context and Understanding ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Research into the unknown. Musings at the earliest stage; wondering what the related memory requirement is along two dimensions (understanding and context). SIGNIFICANCE: Concerns memory management of context and understanding. As data has very little context (merely position in an index), data is nearly a purely memory, 1:1. However, as information has a deeper context (for example, and equation of variables that can hold many data values), the context-understanding ratio is, perhaps, 1:infinity. A more important question the relationship between each of the context levels (index, rule, model, goal, mission) and understanding levels (data, information, knowledge wisdom, and vision). What is the memory ratio of data:information? or index:rule? These are important topics to consider when designing a vision support system (more colloquially known as a information base, or knowledge base, etc.). TOPICS: .


      Consolidation:

    • The Ideal Vision Support System (VSS) ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Describes three dimensions of a hypothetical "ideal VSS": (1) Learning, (2) Sharing, and (3) Memory. SIGNIFICANCE: Sets high targets as guides to research and development of vision support systems (aka decision support systems). TOPICS: Literature review (especially Stanoevska-Slabeva, et al. 1998). Describes the importance of common platform so that "We all know all that is known", which is important to prevent reinventing the wheel and for allocating scarce resources to uncovered areas. Discusses real-time learning on the job (aka just-in-time learning), and a futuristic system in which we don't know and don't care to know where our understanding comes from (perhaps from our own minds, or from a super efficient cybernetic interface that delivers it to our consciousness).
    • Elite Enterprises and Wisdom Management (WM) ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Describes the importance of upper management to establish a culture of wisdom management through adoption of machine systems, and elaborates on the important properties of these machine systems. SIGNIFICANCE: Discusses culture, technology, and metrics that could help enterprises transform into elite enterprises, whose employees and customers recognize new opportunities first, and act first, leading to insurmountable competitive advantage. TOPICS: Literature review. Comparison to existing machine systems. Determining atomicity. The value of (1) KM systems versus document repositories, (2) tacit knowledge capture and distribution, (3) metrics and valuation, (4) context-down learning and training, (5) the culture of domain thinking and communicating, (6) communication between people, and (7) uncertainty in communication.

    • Application:

    • VSS for Engineering.htm ( notes.ppt) ( AmNucSoc-02.ppt) ABSTRACT: Describes the characteristics, implementation, and component demonstrations of a VSS suited to group collaboration in engineering design of massive systems of interdisciplinary knowledge, but based on first principles, analytical equations, extrapolation predictions, or empirical fitting. SIGNIFICANCE: Simple, usable, accessible, transparent, dynamic, the model converges toward reality, standardized, cheap to implement and support. TOPICS: Those listed above.
      • Space Mission Studies Laboratory ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Not yet developed. This would be part of my dissertation work, and would provide a management space for a group collaboration tool based on my research into vision support systems (VSS). SIGNIFICANCE: Public participation, risk management, knowledge sharing, learning, and memory, cost effectiveness, and a sustainable roadmap to planning and developing a space fusion transportation system. TOPICS: Those listed above.
      • NASA NRA based on VSS Programmatics ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Describes to NASA a method of programmatics based on VSSs. With a space fusion transportation system as a long-range goal, the program outlines the steps necessary for a NASA Research Announcement (NRA). The VSS implementation would require all participants to use the standardized VSS as a vehicle for providing knowledge learning, sharing, and memory; to yield transparent, fair, and open-to-the-public research activities. The cost remains small while including the maximum number of expert participants, and including interested public. The result of the program should be concensus, and a knowledge and wisdom base critical for making follow-on decisions of high resource expenditure. Thus, the NRA based on VSSs is a risk-management. SIGNIFICANCE: Public participation, risk management, knowledge sharing, learning, and memory, cost effectiveness, and a sustainable roadmap to planning and developing a space fusion transportation system. TOPICS: Those listed above.
      • Fusion-Electric Energy Studies Laboratory ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Not yet developed. Possibly post-dissertation work, and would provide a management space for applying my work in VSSs to the modeling of fusion-electric power plants. SIGNIFICANCE: Public participation, risk management, knowledge sharing, learning, and memory, cost effectiveness, and a sustainable roadmap to planning and developing a fusion-electric power plant system. TOPICS: Roadmap to a fusion-electric based energy economy, fusion-isotope-generator (FIG), and net fusion power demonstrator (NFPD).
      • Radiation Detectives Laboratory ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Not yet developed. Possibly post-dissertation work, and would provide a management space for applying my work in VSSs to characterization of radiation signatures. SIGNIFICANCE: Public participation, risk management, knowledge sharing, learning, and memory, cost effectiveness, reliability, and total signal characterization. TOPICS: .
      • Evolution Modeling Laboratory ( notes.ppt) ABSTRACT: Not yet developed. Possibly post-dissertation work, and would provide a management space for applying my work in VSSs to characterization of models of evolution and evolutionary algorithms. SIGNIFICANCE: Public participation, risk management, knowledge sharing, learning, and memory, and cost effectiveness. TOPICS: General Theory of Evolution, Group Opportunity, Civilizations, Drake Equation, and Workforce Performance in evolving institutions.

    CHANGE SYNOPSIS:
    20apr03 (Sun)
    New page initiation.
    27apr03 (Sun)
    Added an introduction section to explain the purpose of this page, and
    Added 1 link titled, "Vision".
    28apr03 (Mon)
    Added 1 link titled, "Definitions: Terminology and Acronyms".
    02may03 (Fri)
    Added the link "Paradigm for Domain Thinking",
    Added the link "Problem Descriptions", and
    Added the link "Candiate Publications".
    07may03 (Wed)
    Added a "(graphical roadmap)" in the front matter section,
    Added a link to "Latest reports for SCIS 1200 classes",
    Added a link to "Tactical and Operational Objectives (T&O)", and
    Updated the link to "Candidate Publications".
    08may03 (Thu)
    Added descriptions and powerpoint notes to "Layered-Understanding" and "Evolution of Cognitive Cybernetics".
    09may03 (Fri)
    Added descriptions and powerpoint notes to "Cybernetic Epistemology".
    10may03 (Sat)
    Developed the concept of "Context-down Learning", and added descriptions and powerpoint notes to the link "Context-down Learning".
    11may03 (Sun)
    Added descriptions and powerpoint notes to "Wisdom Discovery" and "The Ideal Vision Support System".
    12may03 (Mon)
    Added descriptions and powerpoint notes to "Measuring the Memory of Context and Understanding".
    13may03 (Tue)
    Added descriptions and powerpoint notes to (1) "Elite Enterprises and Wisdom Management(WM)", (2) "NASA NRA based on VSS Programmatics", and (3) "VSS for Engineering".
    Added my Am. Nucl. Soc. Meeting (June, 2002, Hollywood, Florida) presentation powerpoint slides to "VSS for Engineering".
    20may03 (Tue)
    Added a link to my "DRAFT" Dissertation Idea/Problem Statement.
    06Aug03 (Wed)
    Uploaded my final 1200-course and 1200-project document (single document, Parts I and II) and IDEAs prototype.
    28Sep04 (Tue)
    Built a table listing dissertation docs and related publications, published and planned. Added the Preliminary Dissertation Proposal (v2.0.0)