Artificial intelligence in man-machine systems and automation

It has been shown that artificial intelligence offers the potential to transfer the knowledge-based functions of a human operator to the machine. In systems — such as aircraft, air traffic control and manned space stations — where the human ability to back-up all control functions should be retained, it is important to design the man-machine system in a way to allow operation on different levels of automation (from manual to autonomous). This keeps the human “in the loop” and enables him to “take over” immediately in the case of emergency or system failure. An interesting aspect of the system lay-out is that it allows different locations of the meta-controller. This is the intelligence above the man-machine system, which decides on the goals, on the authority distribution between the man and the machine and has the most complete knowledge of the world in which the man-machine system operates. The meta-control can be assigned to a human or a computer, it can be collocated with the machine or remote (e. g. the ground station in space experiments).