New architectures for constructed complex systems

This paper is an overview of our research program in intelligent systems. O ur object of study is constructed complex systems, which are software and h ardware systems mediated or managed by computers. We describe how biologica l systems provide stiff competition for constructed complex systems in the areas of autonomy and intelligence. robustness, adaptability, and communica tion. We describe our computationally reflective integration infrastructure , called 'wrappings', and show how it can provide many of the necessary fle xibilities. We also describe two directions of research in computational se miotics, which for us means the study of the use of symbols by computing sy stems. We describe our 'conceptual categories', which are a method of knowl edge representation that supports these flexibilities, and some new results on symbol systems, which leads to some new mathematical questions about wh at can be represented in formal systems and how they can be extended automa tically. These are then combined to describe our architecture, which we are currently in the process of implementing, (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Inc. A il rights reserved.