That was the opening sentence from the Executive Director of MECATA Foundation, Dr. Ir. Adhi S. Soembagijo, MSME as a speaker at the Studium Generale ITB, Wednesday (10/11/2021). At the event, Adhi shared his knowledge about “Autonomous System: when humans trust machines to learn and adapt”.

“The autonomic system is the spearhead of current research both on a lab and industrial scale,” said Adhi. He gave an example of a self-driving car indicates that an autonomous system has been implemented on an industrial scale.

The autonomous system itself is taken from the concept of autonomy, namely the ability to complete complex tasks while minimizing human intervention. The autonomous system is a system that has the characteristics of the autonomy.

He explained that the autonomic system begins with repetitive tasks that require speed, power, and accuracy in a static environment. To be an autonomous system, it must be adaptive when interacting with the environment. “The beginning of intelligence is when he can understand and make decisions when he is interacting with the environment,” he said.

In its implementation, interaction data from the environment is collected through sensors, while actuators drive the system’s next action on the environment.

Dr. Ir. Adhi then talked about artificial intelligence or Artificial Intelligence. This artificial intelligence originated from the idea that human intelligence is needed by computers, which are published into a computer system quantitatively through a mathematical approach.

The principle applied is to use past experiences to build knowledge today and predict events that will occur in the future. He also included several videos as additional references on how the autonomous system works, including self-driving cars, self-driving trucks, and the use of drones to deliver packages.

Adhi raised a philosophical question, “What attitude do we need to adopt towards a changing world that is increasingly autonomous?”
“Data from McKinsey in 2017 shows that by 2030 it is predicted that 23 million jobs can be replaced by automation technology in Indonesia, but 27 to 46 million new jobs can be created by automation technology,” said Adhi.

He continued that automation indicates that we do not need to be discouraged by the increasingly widespread autonomic system in life. Still, we must look at it from the proper perspective and angle. Autonomous systems must be viewed from the right angle so that there is no wrong focus, for example, is the marketplace.

In industry 4.0, business processes have changed with the inclusion of artificial intelligence and machine learning; connectivity increases, intelligence increases, and the equipment used are increasingly sophisticated. Industry 4.0 increases productivity and reduces costs at the same time. “Our task, of course, is to think of ways so that this autonomous system can be used as a support and lever for the real sector that we control.”

Reporter: Athira Syifa P.S. (Postharvest Technology, 2019)
Translator: Billy Akbar Prabowo (Metallurgical Engineering 2020)