Question

View the Interaction “Expert Systems”. Identify the characteristics and limitations of expert systems during your class discussion. Include the concepts of fuzzy logic and IF-THEN statements in your discussion.

Answer 1

Benefits of Expert Systems

An expert system captures the expertise of an expert or group of experts in a computer based information system. Thus, it can outperform a single human expert in many problem situations. That’s because an expert system is faster and more consistent, can have the knowledge of several experts, and does not get tired or distracted by overwork or stress. Expert systems also help preserve and reproduce the knowledge of experts.

Limitations of Expert Systems

The major limitations of expert systems arise from their limited focus, inability to learn, maintenance problems, and developmental cost. Expert systems excel only in solving specific types of problems in a limited domain of knowledge. They fail miserably in solving problems requiring a broad knowledge base and subjective problem solving. They do well with specific types of operational or analytical tasks but falter at subjective managerial decision making.

Expert systems may also be difficult and costly to develop and maintain. The costs of knowledge engineers, lost expert time, and hardware and software resources may be too high to offset the benefits expected from some applications. Also, expert systems can’t maintain themselves; that is, they can’t learn from experience but instead must be taught new knowledge and modified as new expertise is needed to match developments in their subject areas.

Fuzzy logic is a logical system and functions as an extension of multivalued logic. This system of reasoning is similar to human reasoning as it makes room for approximate values as well as inferences. Moreover it also allows ambiguous data, also known as fuzzy data.

Expert systems with fuzzy-logic capabilities thus allow for more flexible and creative handling of problems. These systems are used, for example, to control manufacturing processes.

If-then statements play a vital role in majority of fuzzy logic applications. These statements serve as a basis of fuzzy dependency and command language. In other words the if-then statements help in formulating conditional statements that are an integral part of fuzzy logic.