Autonomous System

<Top level summary, most common definition for autonomous system>

Within the robotics community, the term autonomous usually implies some degree of on-board decision making. In some circumstances, it may refer to a spectrum of decision making authority that can include in the degenerate case an automated system with no authority or ability to make decisions about its actions. This kind of scale typically covers the full spectrum of autonomy and includes a fully autonomous system that is entirely responsible for its own action selections, and may also include mixed-initiative systems that collaborate with other agents to arrive at mutually acceptable actions or plans.

History

<Summary of the history of the term - how the definition has changed over time>

• Where was this first used? Who coined the term or started naming them like that?

• Was it called differently before?

Contextual Uses

<Description of the different contexts this term is used in>

• E.g. ISO standards
• IEEE dictionary

Robotics: BSI 8611:2016

"system which has the ability to perform intended tasks based on current state, knowledge and sensing, without human intervention" 

Robotics: IEEE Standards Dictionary

This context draws from standards and published definitions in the physically-embodied robotics community, as distinct from the computer science community or the artificial intelligence community.

• IEEE Standard 7001-2021

  A system that has the capacity to make decisions itself in response to some input data or stimulus with a varying degree of human oversight or intervention depending on the system’s level of autonomy.

Artificial Intelligence: IEEE Standards Dictionary

This context draws from standards and published definitions in the artificial intelligence community, as distinct from the computer science community or the physically-embodied robotics community.

• IEEE Standard 7010-2021

  A semi-autonomous or autonomous computer-controlled system programmed to carry out some task with or without limited human intervention capable of decision making by independent inference and successfully adapting to its context. An example is an A/IS that refers to a computer system instantiated in a product or service. NOTE—For the purposes of IEEE Std 7010, A/IS encompasses AI and information systems (IS).

Other Definitions

This section captures definitions of autonomous system that are used in other fields, outside the scope of this Body of Knowledge. They are included here to enable users to identify when their application area may introduce confusion.

Networking

Computing Security Resource Center (NIST)

• NIST SP 800-54: One or more routers under a single administration operating the same routing policy.
• NIST TN 2060: An Autonomous System specifies a network, mostly an organization that can own or announce network addresses to the Internet.

Mathematics

Wolfram defines autonomous system as a system of ordinary differential equations which do not explicitly contain the independent variable. See [1]