The Use of Intelligent Systems for Social and Economic Development

Abstract

‘The world is entering a new period. The wealth of nations, which depended upon land, labour, and capital during its agricultural and industrial phases — depended upon natural resources, the accumulation of money, and even upon weaponry — will come in the future to depend upon information, knowledge, and intelligence.’ The quotation is from a book by Feigenbaum and McCorduck (1983), who describe the launching of the fifth-generation computing project by the Japanese and the adoption of some paradigms of intelligent computing (such as logic programming). This is one of the projects that recognises the changing era and the need to restructure the means of production. As in the earlier phases the emergence of the information era indicates the possibility of another restructuring of the world power blocks. (This view would impose the need to change the notions such as ‘developing’ and ‘developed’ when referring to peoples and nations. We may need to redefine these terms in the near future.) It is in this context that we examine some issues in knowledge-based technologies. Since these, by and large have arisen out of research in artificial intelligence, it is worthwhile now to look at the issues as a whole.