A process algebra based framework for promise theory

We present a process algebra based approach to formalize the interactions of computing devices such as the representation of policies and the resolution of conflicts. As an example we specify how promises may be used in coming to an agreement regarding a simple though practical transportation problem.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure

From distributed coordination to field calculus and aggregate computing

open6siThis work has been partially supported by: EU Horizon 2020 project HyVar (www.hyvar-project .eu), GA No. 644298; ICT COST Action IC1402 ARVI (www.cost -arvi .eu); Ateneo/CSP D16D15000360005 project RunVar (runvar-project.di.unito.it).Aggregate computing is an emerging approach to the engineering of complex coordination for distributed systems, based on viewing system interactions in terms of information propagating through collectives of devices, rather than in terms of individual devices and their interaction with their peers and environment. The foundation of this approach is the distillation of a number of prior approaches, both formal and pragmatic, proposed under the umbrella of field-based coordination, and culminating into the field calculus, a universal functional programming model for the specification and composition of collective behaviours with equivalent local and aggregate semantics. This foundation has been elaborated into a layered approach to engineering coordination of complex distributed systems, building up to pragmatic applications through intermediate layers encompassing reusable libraries of program components. Furthermore, some of these components are formally shown to satisfy formal properties like self-stabilisation, which transfer to whole application services by functional composition. In this survey, we trace the development and antecedents of field calculus, review the field calculus itself and the current state of aggregate computing theory and practice, and discuss a roadmap of current research directions with implications for the development of a broad range of distributed systems.embargoed_20210910Viroli, Mirko; Beal, Jacob; Damiani, Ferruccio; Audrito, Giorgio; Casadei, Roberto; Pianini, DaniloViroli, Mirko; Beal, Jacob; Damiani, Ferruccio; Audrito, Giorgio; Casadei, Roberto; Pianini, Danil

Towards goal-based autonomic networking

The ability to quickly deploy and efficiently manage services is critical to the telecommunications industry. Currently, services are designed and managed by different teams with expertise over a wide range of concerns, from high-level business to low level network aspects. Not only is this approach expensive in terms of time and resources, but it also has problems to scale up to new outsourcing and/or multi-vendor models, where subsystems and teams belong to different organizations. We endorse the idea, upheld among others in the autonomic computing community, that the network and system components involved in the provision of a service must be crafted to facilitate their management. Furthermore, they should help bridge the gap between network and business concerns. In this paper, we sketch an approach based on early work on the hierarchical organization of autonomic entities that possibly belong to different organizations. An autonomic entity governs over other autonomic entities by defining their goals. Thus, it is up to each autonomic entity to decide its line of actions in order to fulfill its goals, and the governing entity needs not know about the internals of its subordinates. We illustrate the approach with a simple but still rich example of a telecom service

Double elevation: Autonomous weapons and the search for an irreducible law of war

What should be the role of law in response to the spread of artificial intelligence in war? Fuelled by both public and private investment, military technology is accelerating towards increasingly autonomous weapons, as well as the merging of humans and machines. Contrary to much of the contemporary debate, this is not a paradigm change; it is the intensification of a central feature in the relationship between technology and war: Double elevation, above one's enemy and above oneself. Elevation above one's enemy aspires to spatial, moral, and civilizational distance. Elevation above oneself reflects a belief in rational improvement that sees humanity as the cause of inhumanity and de-humanization as our best chance for humanization. The distance of double elevation is served by the mechanization of judgement. To the extent that judgement is seen as reducible to algorithm, law becomes the handmaiden of mechanization. In response, neither a focus on questions of compatibility nor a call for a 'ban on killer robots' help in articulating a meaningful role for law. Instead, I argue that we should turn to a long-standing philosophical critique of artificial intelligence, which highlights not the threat of omniscience, but that of impoverished intelligence. Therefore, if there is to be a meaningful role for law in resisting double elevation, it should be law encompassing subjectivity, emotion and imagination, law irreducible to algorithm, a law of war that appreciates situated judgement in the wielding of violence for the collective

Hydrolink 2021/2. Artificial Intelligence

Topic: Artificial Intelligenc

Internet of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles—A Multilayer Low-Altitude Airspace Model for Distributed UAV Traffic Management

The rapid adoption of Internet of Things (IoT) has encouraged the integration of new connected devices such as Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to the ubiquitous network. UAVs promise a pragmatic solution to the limitations of existing terrestrial IoT infrastructure as well as bring new means of delivering IoT services through a wide range of applications. Owning to their potential, UAVs are expected to soon dominate the low-altitude airspace over populated cities. This introduces new research challenges such as the safe management of UAVs operation under high traffic demands. This paper proposes a novel way of structuring the uncontrolled, low-altitude airspace, with the aim of addressing the complex problem of UAV traffic management at an abstract level. The work, hence, introduces a model of the airspace as a weighted multilayer network of nodes and airways and presents a set of experimental simulation results using three UAV traffic management heuristics

Organizational Posthumanism

Building on existing forms of critical, cultural, biopolitical, and sociopolitical posthumanism, in this text a new framework is developed for understanding and guiding the forces of technologization and posthumanization that are reshaping contemporary organizations. This ‘organizational posthumanism’ is an approach to analyzing, creating, and managing organizations that employs a post-dualistic and post-anthropocentric perspective and which recognizes that emerging technologies will increasingly transform the kinds of members, structures, systems, processes, physical and virtual spaces, and external ecosystems that are available for organizations to utilize. It is argued that this posthumanizing technologization of organizations will especially be driven by developments in three areas: 1) technologies for human augmentation and enhancement, including many forms of neuroprosthetics and genetic engineering; 2) technologies for synthetic agency, including robotics, artificial intelligence, and artificial life; and 3) technologies for digital-physical ecosystems and networks that create the environments within which and infrastructure through which human and artificial agents will interact. Drawing on a typology of contemporary posthumanism, organizational posthumanism is shown to be a hybrid form of posthumanism that combines both analytic, synthetic, theoretical, and practical elements. Like analytic forms of posthumanism, organizational posthumanism recognizes the extent to which posthumanization has already transformed businesses and other organizations; it thus occupies itself with understanding organizations as they exist today and developing strategies and best practices for responding to the forces of posthumanization. On the other hand, like synthetic forms of posthumanism, organizational posthumanism anticipates the fact that intensifying and accelerating processes of posthumanization will create future realities quite different from those seen today; it thus attempts to develop conceptual schemas to account for such potential developments, both as a means of expanding our theoretical knowledge of organizations and of enhancing the ability of contemporary organizational stakeholders to conduct strategic planning for a radically posthumanized long-term future

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Metaverse

Non peer reviewe