Engineering Optimal Individuals

by Arlin Cooper and Rush Robinett III
Albuquerque, New Mexico

Pages 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Derivation of Characteristics for an Optimum Individual

The starting point for (bottom-up) engineering design of an "optimum" individual is to consider the functional conversion of inputs to outputs within "constraints" (inherent restrictions that are invariant or relatively difficult to change without significant long-term effort). The inputs are the inherent environments that individuals can use. The outputs are the goals for the individual to achieve. Individual goals are reached or approached by choosing paths toward the goals, optimally if possible. One immediate complication is that inputs, output goals, paths toward the goals, constraints and the degree of optimality are all relative, not absolute. In fact, all human perceptions are relative.

Figure 2 — Starting Point for Engineering Design of an Optimum Individual.

In Figure 2, examples of the environment are energy sources to fuel the body, information sources to be processed by the brain and "conventional" environments, such as light, heat and air. Examples of constraints are societal laws that are intended to control or influence individual behavior, and natural laws, such as the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics (energy is conserved; thermodynamic entropy ultimately increases). Examples of goals are individual survival, surety and productivity. To optimally achieve goals, some desirable individual characteristics can be strong contributors. For example, characteristics such as drive, passion in the heart and extensive knowledge are desirable.

Individuals Within a Collective Structure

Before further developing the proposed engineering design of individuals, a top-down context can help determine a more informative framework. From a top-down view, numerous factors transcend the individual. One is that individuals almost always function as part of a collective. Collective teams have a clarity of purpose through a mutual context viewed from many different perspectives. These relative viewpoints help improve the overall perspective, including relative views of team goals and paths toward those goals. Since humanity is a collective, interpersonal communication can be a strong contributor to humanity, team and general collective performance. The benefits of collective participation [Ref. 4] are similar to the construction of a hologram from fragmented transforms: the whole entity benefits from multiple "views" and participatory contributions. It has recently been discovered [Ref. 4] that collectives comprising distributed minimally functional robots can outperform sophisticated centrally controlled systems. This is a dramatic demonstration of the synergistic power of cooperating team members.

A "management" overlay is also important. The management function can be accomplished in a variety of ways (individually, or in combination). Figure 3 depicts the context within which individuals perform.

Figure 3 — Indication of the Context Within Which Individuals Function.

Contribution of Individuals to Collective Goals

Individuals will now be examined from a bottom-up view, but using the previous top-down context. The benefit of iterating between top-down and bottom-up structures is that the complementary views contribute to the identification of comprehensive considerations for individuals. Consideration of collectives demonstrates that individual input environments, output goals and organizational constraints should be supplemented to achieve optimum individual design. But wherever there are interfaces and interactions (e.g., human-to-human or human-to-environment), there can be interferences (undesired ramifications, or "hazards") [Refs. 5, 6].

Communication from other individuals is another necessary input. External management must be added. Management examples are team leaders, organization management, and local, regional, national or international governments. These are considered to be "constraints" (inherent influences) on individual performance. Outputs should include collective as well as individual goals. Individual goals should include self-improvement or self-actualization, which is also a collective goal. In cognitive science, self-actualization means perceived competence to satisfy basic needs in due time. Because the world is inherently non-ideal, there are hazards that can impede individual performance. Sources of these hazards include human limitations, human threats and natural threats; and these are shown as influences at the bottom of the "individual" module in Figure 4. The individual traits desired include passion, skills and judgment, so these must be added to the model. The development of such traits can come from several sources. Communication from other individuals and controls from management are potential contributors. Self-generated contributions are also important. The influences that are part of this sequence can be delayed in time, often called latent effects (sources of influence that are not immediately influential, but can have a later influence). The consideration of latent effects is similar to psychoanalysis, but from an engineering modeling viewpoint.

Self-actualization and collective contributions can be utilized through an action process as derived inputs to contribute to desirable traits. The action process involves self-testing in order to measure performance and to decide on corrective steps when necessary. As a means of preventing the instability that can occur in feedback systems, the response time constant must be great enough that corrections will not cause uncontrolled responses. This means that the action process must be deliberate, judicious and viewed over a long-enough time to see latent effects. These considerations lead to an expanded bottom-up view of the engineered individual. These concepts are detailed in Figure 4.

Figure 4 — Expanded Engineered Design Model for an Optimal Individual.

Inputs

Environment. The environment includes energy sources to fuel the body, since individuals are exergy parasites. The goal is to use exergy symbiotically, rather than destructively. Paradoxically, providing sources of exergy is an order-producing activity; consumption is an order-destroying activity. There are also information sources to be sensed by seeing, hearing, touching, smelling and tasting. These are processed by the brain. Humans are also exposed to light, heat and air. An interesting observation is that all of these input sources are perceived relative to stored reference patterns, some of which may be highly dynamic. For example, exposure to a hot temperature feels hotter after exposure to a cold temperature than it does following exposure to a warm temperature. After a period of exposure to a new temperature level, the reference changes. Our contention is that all human perception of inputs is relative to dynamic reference patterns. There do not appear to be any inarguable perception absolutes.

Communication. Interpersonal communication has various purposes and provides various degrees of information. Issues include trust, honesty, semantics and game-playing [Refs. 2, 3]. Unique-Signal communication approaches are a useful tool for enhancing communication effectiveness, and communication entropy is a useful tool for developing performance metrics [Ref. 2]. From an individual viewpoint, information received can be used to improve individual functionality.

Self-Actualization. Self-actualization is an individual input, derived through a self-generated action process. The intent is to enable individuals to "test" their performance and to continuously improve. Self-actualization increases individual order, which increases the chances of individual and societal survival.

Synergistic Collective Contributions. This is another individually derived input, and is based on teaming skills, such as information sharing and mutual support. This input can also involve self-testing as part of the action process.

Constraints

Management Controls. Management controls are an organizational technique intended to encourage more ordered collectives. These can include rules, regulations, punishments, influences and rewards. We will use the influential nature of management controls as a way to optimally utilize individuals for collective benefit in the following section.

Societal Controls. Societal controls are similar to management controls, but have some different motivations and effects. Examples are laws, infrastructures and processes established by governments. Religions exert varying degrees of behavioral influence on individuals, especially regarding morality and ethics. There are also individual moral and ethical controls (e.g., conscience).

Physical Laws. Physical laws constrain the manner in which individuals survive and function. Two of the most principle-based laws are the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics. The First Law of Thermodynamics basically asserts that energy is conserved; the Second Law of Thermodynamics states that ordered distributions of energy will ultimately disperse, measured by increasing thermodynamic entropy. A second law efficiency is the ratio of the minimum amount of available work required to do a particular job to the amount of available work used to do the job. This is in contrast to the first law efficiency, which is the ratio of energy out to energy in. These efficiency concepts can help us measure how optimal an individual is.

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