Pieter J. Mosterman
Computation of Things:
Challenges and Solutions for the Needs of Humanity
Presented with Justyna Zander
The current exponential growth of technologies is providing novel, frequently unimaginable ways of leveraging its applications for human needs. Ubiquitous communication capabilities allow a redefinition of an individual person as one who is becoming an integrated part of the virtual world and vice versa. The challenge of sustainable development of those trends from the perspective of a single human and humanity as such remains unsolved.
In the presented vision various aspects of the sustainability (e.g., the relation between a person’s quality of life, climate change, and social awareness) are highlighted to explore and share how an individual impacts and is impacted by the surrounding. Ultimately a technological solution called Computation of Things (CoTh) is outlined. It allows for a quick and reliable assessment of people’s possible decision paths and how this affects sustainable development on a local and global scale. Forecasting life-path alternatives for a human based on its geographic position (including pollution level, energy usage), activity patterns (including nutrition habits, lifestyle, travelling load, family status, circle of friends, social network, or virtual life), and state patterns (including individual’s DNA, current health conditions, musculature) is targeted.
CoTh enables an understanding of the individual self and its surrounding based on the micro-scale information that combines with macro-scale data to enable prediction of different life scenarios. It is defined as an abundant supply of predictive computation capabilities of high performance and large-scale applicability with high accuracy and quality so as to allow for providing humanity’s physical, physiological, mental, and spiritual needs in a profound and as of yet unfathomed manner.
Its core is strongly connoted with physical systems engineering. Thus, a parallelly-conducted research on the notion of computation deploys computational models as the primary representations of physics, instead of attempting to approximate first principles ever closer. A theory of treating models as dynamic systems themselves follows. This evokes the promise for a fundamental breakthrough in terms of computational semantics the significance of which becomes paramount as far as the faithfulness of the predictions is considered.
Dr. Pieter J. Mosterman is a Senior Research Scientist in Real-Time and Modeling and Simulation Technologies, The MathWorks, Inc., Natick, MA, USA (since 2001) and an Adjunct Professor at the School of Computer Science at McGill University in Montreal, Canada (since 2009). He received the Ph.D. degree (1997) in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, and the Master of Science (1991) in Electrical Engineering from the University of Twente, The Netherlands.
Previously, he held a research position at the German Aerospace Center in Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany (1997-2001). His primary research interests are in hybrid dynamic systems and computer automated multiparadigm modeling (CAMPaM), with principal applications in embedded control systems, training systems, and fault detection, isolation, and reconfiguration. He is an editor and committee member of numerous international journals, books, conferences, and workshops.
