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Multiple Internet of Intelligences for Risk Analysis*
Chongfu Huang1,2
1. Academy of Disaster Reduction and Emergency Management, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China
2. Beijing Cazl Technology Service Co., Ltd., Beijing 100088, China
E-mail: hchongfu@bnu.edu.cn
Received 24 April 2014
Accepted 4 June 2014
Abstract
In this study, we define a multiple Internet of intelligences (M-IOI) as the processing of homological information in
layers. If agents in an M-IOI not only provide information in response to a question asked by a customer but also
review information from other agents and summarize it, we refer to this as a summarizing M-IOI. The fuzzy
mathematics method of normal diffusion is suggested to transform the summaries into fuzzy sets so that a
satisfactory answer to the question is given. A summarizing M-IOI is used in a case study of typhoon dynamic risk
in Wenzhou, China, where an insurance company wants to know whether the level of the risk will increase
significantly. The effective knowledge in a summarizing M-IOI is measured to evaluate the quality of the answer.
We also discuss the relation between IOIs and a global brain.
Keywords: Internet of Intelligences; Risk Analysis; Fuzzy Set; Normal Diffusion; Typhoon Dynamic Risk
1. Introduction
*Project supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) (No.2012CB955402), and partly supported by the Beijing Cazl
Technology Service Co., Ltd..
An Internet of intelligences (IOI) is a new website tool
that collects and integrates messages, experience,
knowledge, and judgment from intelligent agents to
provide answers to questions from users (Huang, 2011).
Unlike Google and Quora (Gannes, 2010), an IOI uses
models to process the information from various agents
to produce satisfactory answers.
A redesigned Google website could directly process
“millions of different fact-seeking searches” and
provide short answers at part of its results. “Google
Questions and Answers” would allow users to
collaboratively find satisfactory answers to their
questions through the web. Quora considers the
contributions it inspires a sort of “inverse blogging.” If
someone asks a question, it is because he or she wants
an answer.
Google is a web search engine that allows users find
other sites on the web based on keyword searches. Any
answer suggested by Google must be supported by the
sheer volume of web pages. Quora is a dialogue
platform in which a user can ask a question on the
Quora website and quickly receive answers from the
network members who possess the relevant knowledge
(Badilescu-Buga, 2013).
Neither Google nor Quora fully utilizes the pool of
opinions on the Internet to answer questions. The main
reason is that, although semantic analysis appears to be
theoretically powerful on the web, it cannot process the
missing structured data (Habernal and Konopik, 2013)
to provide a satisfactory answer.
The concept of an IOI arose from online services for
customers who have questions regarding some element
of risk. There are always others who have experience,
knowledge, and judgment concerning these questions
(Huang, 2011). An IOI is an Internet-based service in
which people employed by the service act as intelligent
agents, and models are used to process the information
provided by the agents.
Journal of Risk Analysis and Crisis Response, Vol. 4, No. 2 (June 2014), 61-71
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C.F. Huang
The first IOI was constructed to serve applicants to
universities based on their entrance exam scores. The
IOI collects and processes suggestions from college
students and high school teachers. This system can help
applicants choose among colleges and increase the
probability of their being accepted to their first choice
of schools, which is the greatest concern of their
families. Another IOI has been used to survey the
demand for typhoon insurance from the aquaculture
industry in Wenzhou, China (Ai, 2014). The third IOI
was designed to assist in writing proposals for grants.
This IOI increases the chances of success for applicants
facing a highly competitive environment and
asymmetric information.
In practice, it is very difficult to build a complex
mathematical model to process natural language
information in an IOI that is both soft and flexible. To
overcome this difficulty in this study, we propose a
multiple IOI in which the agents not only provide
information but also acquire knowledge by summarizing
information.
This study is organized as follows. In Section 2, we
define an IOI. In Section 3, we define a multiple IOI
with layers. In Section 4, we suggest a multiple IOI to
summarize information. Then, in Section 5 we employ
the normal diffusion technique to integrate the
summaries for risk analysis. Section 6 presents an
application of a multiple IOI in analyzing typhoon
dynamic risk. Section 7 presents a model to measure the
effective knowledge in an IOI and the quality of service.
Conclusions are provided in Section 8.
2. Internet of Intelligences
The concept of an Internet of intelligences (IOI) is
based on the observation that everyone can act as an
intelligent agent, having relatively more knowledge than
others on some topic that may be used to help others to
solve some problem through the Internet. For example,
a tourist can answer questions regarding travel
information (e.g., safety, discounts, or fraud) based on
his/her experience. An IOI is intended to offer satisfying
solutions for customers through human agents that
apply their experience, knowledge and judgment to
solve the customer’s problems.
To define an IOI, we first define the following terms:
agent, network and model.
An individual who can provide others with
experience, knowledge, and judgment to solve problems
is called an intelligent agent or simply an agent.
A computer system through which the agents can
serve customers is called a network. The Internet is the
most convenient network. In the remainder of the paper,
unless stated otherwise, “network” refers to the Internet.
A scientific model is a representation of an object or
a system. Any mathematical expression describing
relationships among variables, any mathematical
operation for processing information and any human
brain paradigm for analyzing questions can be called a
model. In the remainder of the paper, unless stated
otherwise, “model” refers to a mathematical model or a
human brain paradigm for processing information. For
example, the linear regression method is a mathematical
model. The set of rules used by an editor-in-chief of a
journal is a human brain paradigm for processing the
information in the comments from reviewers on papers
submitted to the journal.
Slightly revising the definition given by Huang
(Huang, 2011), we formally present a definition of an
Internet of intelligences (IOI):
Definition 1. Let A be a set of agents, let N be a
network used by A, and let M be a model to process
information provided by A. A triple is called
an Internet of intelligences, denoted as F.
An IOI is a network that provides knowledge
products, where more than one intelligent agent is
connected by a computer network and the agents’
experiences, knowledge, judgment are collected and
integrated by some model. If the model of an IOI is
overly coarse, its product will be of low quality.
To evaluate an IOI F, we suppose that there is a tool
T that can measure the intelligence level of ai in A={a1,
a2,..., an}, i.e., qi = T(ai). In addition, we assume that Z
can measure the intelligence level of F, i.e., Q = Z(F).
When Q>max{q1, q2,..., qn}, the IOI is called a positive
IOI. Slightly revising the definition given by Huang
(Huang, 2011), we have the following definition:
Definition 2. Let F= be an Internet of
intelligences with an intelligence level Q. Let the
highest intelligence level of the individuals in A be q. If
Q>q, F is called a positive Internet of intelligences,
denoted as F↑.
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Multiple Internet of Intelligences for Risk Analysis
For example, let A={John, Mary, Smith} be a team
participating in a trivia quiz game. In this competition,
all players must wait until the host reads a question,
after which a light is turned on as a “ready” signal. The
players press a button when they know the answer, and
the first player to press their button wins the chance to
respond. John, Mary and Smith use an IOI to compete,
but other teams do not. That is, an IOI will compete
with the other teams. In this case, the score is used to
measure the intelligence level of a player. We suppose
that the scores of John, Mary and Smith in a past
competition are q1, q2, and q3, respectively. The team's
score is q1+q2+q3. Without loss of generality, we assume
q1>q2, q3. When the team competes again using the IOI,
the team's score is S. The intelligence level of the IOI is
defined as Q = S/3. If Q>q1, the IOI is positive.
A simple IOI is illustrated in Fig. 1, and its topology
is shown in Fig. 2.
The architecture of an IOI serving customers is
illustrated in Fig. 3. The most important ingredient for
constructing a positive IOI is to have a powerful model
M to extract and summarize knowledge from the
information provided by the agents and then to construct
knowledge products. Strictly speaking, it is the task of
artificial intelligence to find M. Currently, IBM’s
“Watson”, a supercomputer system capable of
answering questions posed in natural language (Ferrucci
et al., 2013), has the highest level of artificial
intelligence. In a recent competition, Watson had access
to 200 million pages of structured and unstructured
content requiring four terabytes of disk storage. This
content included the full text of Wikipedia, although the
system was not connected to the Internet during the
game. The algorithms used in “Watson” are very
complex, and the system is supported by an extremely
large database.
To alleviate the difficulty of discovering a complex
model, in the next section we propose a multiple IOI to
process information.
3. Multiple Internet of Intelligences
In practice, the information in an IOI might be
heterogeneous, gathered from multiple sources such as
natural language, databases and images. It is very
Agents
Customer’s
questions
Databases Online documents
S M
Answers
Fig. 3. An Internet of intelligences provides customers with
answers to questions. Unlike other Q&A systems, an IOI uses
information from agents and applies models to process the
information, where S is a network server and M is a
mathematical model.
c1
c2 c3
a1
a2
a3
S(network server)
M(mathematical model)
Fig. 1. A simple Internet of intelligences composed of a
network server S, a mathematical model M, three computers c1,
c2, and c3 and three agents a1, a2, and a3.
a1
S M
a2 a3
Fig. 2. Topology of the example Internet of intelligences
composed of three nodes, where S is the network server, M is
a mathematical model and a1, a2, and a3 are agents.
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C.F. Huang
difficult to construct a complex mathematical model to
process such information. To alleviate this difficulty,
the process is divided into several layers.
By analogy, files in the graphics editing software
Photoshop can be composed of layers containing any
manner of fills, strokes, images, fonts and miscellaneous
objects to enable easy editing. It would be easier for an
IOI to process homological information using the same
approach. The homological information includes the
experiences of agents, databases, monitoring systems,
judgment, and reasoning that can be combined and
modified using mathematical models. When the number
of the layers in an IOI is greater than one, the IOI is
called a multiple Internet of intelligences (M-IOI).
Formally, we give the following two definitions:
Definition 3. Let F= be an Internet of
intelligences. A process for processing homological
information in F is called a layer of F.
Definition 4. Let F= be an Internet of
intelligences. If the number of layers of F is greater
than one, F is called a multiple Internet of intelligences.
An M-IOI consisting of three layers is illustrated in
Fig. 4. The information in each layer is homological; i.e.,
it is of the same type. Three separate models are used to
process the individual layers. Lastly, a more complex
model is used to integrate the results from the models.
In an IOI, a model can be a scientific model, a
human brain paradigm or a special tool. We use ME,
MO, BP, OT to denote mathematical expressions,
mathematical operations, human brain paradigms and
other tools, respectively. Then, a model M in an IOI
must be an element or a combination of elements of the
set M in Eq. (1).
{ , , , }ME MO BP OT=M (1)
The most difficult task is to process online
information contained in natural language expressions;
even the processing only summarizes the information.
Because humans are better than any mathematical
model at understanding and summarizing information in
natural language expressions, we employ a human brain
paradigm for summarizing information to create an M-
IOI.
4. A Multiple Internet of Intelligences for
Summarizing
The simplest task for Model 1 in Fig. 4 is to summarize
the information provided by agents responding to
questions that are asked by a customer. We denote a
question as H and the response of agent a as e=a(H). If
there are n agents a1, a2, …, an responding to a question
H, the IOI will have a set E of n responses, as shown in
Eq. (2).
E={e1, e2, …, en} (2)
The function of a “summarizing” model is to process
E and output a summary. If e1, e2, …, en are data, it is
easy to find a statistical model to summarize them.
However, if the responses are expressed in natural
language, it is very difficult for a mathematical model to
summarize the information. In this case, we invoke the
agents to summarize. We do not know how an agent
summarizes E, but we know that he/she is able to do so.
The means for processing the natural language
information is a human brain paradigm.
Without loss of generality, we assume that an agent
a summarizes E and produces a summary Ea. For
simplicity, the summary
ia
E given by agent ai is written
as Ei. In general, the summaries given by the agents will
be different. If the summaries are expressed in natural
language, it is difficult to find a mathematical model
that will provide an integrated answer the customer’s
a
b
d
c
Online Layer
Document Layer
Database Layer
Model 3
Model 2
Model 1
Customer’s
questions
S M
Answers
Fig. 4. A multiple Internet of intelligences consists of three
layers to process online information, documents and databases
separately, where a, b, c, d,… are agents.
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Multiple Internet of Intelligences for Risk Analysis
question. To obtain structured data, “summarizing”
must be performed according to some rules.
A question arises if and only if there are
uncertainties in a customer’s mind. For example, if a
businessman has to choose among four cities in a
district to invest in a flower shop, his question is
H: Which cite will give me the largest profit? (3)
The profit depends on the drought risk and the
number of customers (Huang and Inoue, 2007). The
uncertainties in H are “the drought risks in each of the
four cities” and “the number of customers in each of the
four cities”. In some sense, answering a question
reduces or describes the uncertainties. This is the role of
risk analysis.
Assuming that a question must be related to some
uncertainties, an agent can summarize e1, e2, …, en by
completing a form (e.g., a questionnaire) and thus
reduce the uncertainties. Then, the sets E1, E2, …, En
will be quantitative. That is, a set of responses E to a
question H can be quantified using summaries. The
summaries provide data samples that can be processed
by a mathematical model to produce a satisfactory
answer. Figure 5 shows the summarizing M-IOI.
In general, a customer purchases a service for the
lowest possible price. The service is expected to be
performed by some deadline. This expectation implies
that the number of agents responding a question will be
limited. When the size of a sample is small (below 30),
we recommend the normal diffusion technique to
process the samples.
5. Normal Diffusion Technique for Risk
Assessment
The concept of information diffusion (Huang, 1997)
was first introduced in function learning from a small
sample of data (Huang and Moraga, 2004). The
approximate reasoning of information diffusion was
used to estimate probabilities and fuzzy relationships
from scant, incomplete data for grassland wildfires (Liu
et al., 2010). The interior-outer-set model, which is
based on information diffusion theory, can be used to
calculate a possibility–probability distribution from a
small sample. This model provided better multi-valued
results for flood risk management (Zou et al., 2012).
Information diffusion theory was used to evaluate
accident rates in dangerous chemical transportation and
analyze the consequences of such accidents with GIS
simulation technology (Zhang and Zhao, 2007). The use
of information diffusion for fuzzy mathematics can be
illustrated as follows (Huang, 2002).
Let { 1 2 }iX x | i , , ,m= = be a given sample and
let }{uU = be its universe. The function in Eq. (4) is
called a normal diffusion function.
.,],
2
)(
exp[),( 2
2
UuXx
h
ux
ux ∈∈
−
−=μ (4)
The diffusion coefficient h can be calculated using Eq.
(5) (Huang, 2012)
0.8146 ( ), 5;
0.5690 ( ), 6;
0.4560 ( ), 7;
0.3860 ( ), 8;
0.3362 ( ), 9;
0.2986 ( ), 10;
2.6851( )/( 1)
b a m
b a m
b a m
h b a m
b a m
b a m
b a m
− =
− =
− =
= − =
− =
− =
− − , 11.m
⎧
⎪
⎪
⎪
⎪
⎨
⎪
⎪
⎪
⎪ ≥⎩
(5)
where
11
max { } and min { }i ii mi mb x a x .≤ ≤≤ ≤= =
a
b
d
c
Online Layer
Samples Layer
Customer’s
questions
S MO
Answers
Summarizing
(BP)
Uncertainty 1
Uncertainty 2
Uncertainty 3
º º
Fig. 5. A summarizing M-IOI consists of two layers. A
human brain paradigm (BP) titled “Summarizing” is used to
process online information and output data samples. A
mathematical operation (MO) is used to process the samples.
Here, S is a network server, and a, b, c, d,… are agents.
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C.F. Huang
If ix X∈ is a piece of information describing a risk,
we can use the normal diffusion function to process
X for risk assessment. Specifically, when 1 2 mx , x , , x
are m judgments, we can obtain a comprehensive
judgment through the following steps:
Step 1: Using Eq. (5), calculate a diffusion
coefficient h.
Step 2: Using Eq. (4) , {1, 2, , },i i m∀ ∈
transform a sample point xi into a fuzzy set
with the membership function in Eq. (6)
( )
( ) exp[ ],
i
2
i
x 2
x u
u u U .
2h
μ
−
= − ∈ (6)
Step 3: Sum over all of the membership functions
1
( ),x uμ 2 ( ), , ( )mx xu uμ μ to obtain the
function
2
2
1
( )
( ) exp[ ], .
2
m
i
i
x u
f u u U
h=
−
= − ∈∑ (7)
Step 4: Find the absolute maximum (u0, f(u0)) of f(u)
on U using software such as Mathematica or
MATLAB The critical point u0 is the
comprehensive judgment we seek.
The critical point u0 is more robust than the simple
average given in Eq. (8); i.e., when m is small, a larger
individual deviation will not significantly change the
result.
1 2
1
( )mx x x xm
= + + + (8)
For example, assume the universe U = [0, 1], and let
the judgments be 1 2 3 4 50.3, 0.4x x x x x= = = = = . We
have
h = 0.8146(0.4-0.3) = 0.08146, 2h2=0.01327
2 2(0.3 ) (0.4 )
( ) 4 exp[ ]+ exp[ ], .
0.01327 0.01327
u u
f u u U
− −
= − − ∈
The absolute maximum of )(uf (see Fig. 6(a)) is at
(0.3124, 4.515), so the critical point is u0=0.3124. The
simple average of x1, x2, …, x5 is
1
(0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.4) 0.32.
5
x = + + + + =
If the judgment of agent 5 differs more from the
others, e.g., 5 0.8,x′ = then the absolute maximum of
)(uf ′ (see Fig. 6(b)) will be at 0( , ) (0.3, 4).u v′ ′ = The
simple average is 0.4.x′ = We have
0 0| | 0.0124 0.08 | | .u u x x′ ′− = < = −
This example demonstrates that the comprehensive
judgment u0 is more robust than the simple average x .
In gymnastics competitions, the highest and lowest
scores for an athlete are discarded to avoid biased
judging. In risk analysis, however, any information is
important, particularly when the sample size is small. In
this case, the normal diffusion technique can provide a
comprehensive judgment that is robust (no one
individual can grossly affect a result with a significantly
different input).
6. A Case Study in Typhoon Dynamic Risk
China is a country that has suffered devastation from
numerous typhoons in its long history. On average, 7.2
typhoons affect China every year. Most of these
typhoons occur on the southeastern coast of China.
However, the typhoon risk is changing because of
socio-economic development and population growth.
One of the most important issues in planning for
typhoon-related damage is to assess typhoon dynamic
risk.
6.1. Question and responses
Suppose that a new insurance company is considering
selling policies to clients in Wenzhou, a coastal city in
Zhejiang province with nearly 60,000 residents. The
company’s profits will be sensitive to the risk of
typhoon-related damage. If the level of risk is expected
to increase in the next year, the company will not offer
0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
1
2
3
4
0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
1
2
3
4
(a) 1 2 3 4
5
0.3,
0.4
x x x x
x
= = = =
=
(b) 1 2 3 4
5
0.3,
0.8
x x x x
x
= = = =
′ =
Fig. 6. The normal diffusion technique can robustly give a
comprehensive judgment: a critical point. A larger individual
deviation can substantially change a function, e.g., (a) versus
(b), but the critical points for the absolute maximums, (0.3124,
4.515) and (0.3, 4), are not substantially different.
uu
v v
( )f u ( )f u′
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Multiple Internet of Intelligences for Risk Analysis
coverage to clients there, but if the risk is expected to
decrease, the company will offer coverage.
In general, the company will conduct research or
fund an external organization to study this problem. As
a result, data on typhoons and resulting disasters will be
collected and studied. In addition, reports published by
the IPCC and the development plans for Wenzhou must
be reviewed. This research will require a substantial
amount of time and money. In contrast, a multiple IOI
supported by climatologists, meteorologists and
government offices could accomplish the task more
quickly and at a lower cost.
Suppose that the company issues the following
question: Our company provides insurance, and we are
considering whether to sell policies in Wenzhou, where
the risk of loss from typhoons is high. If the level of risk
is likely to increase next year, possibly due to global
warming, we will not sell policies there. If the level of
risk is likely to decrease, possibly due to improvements
in drainage systems, then we will sell policies there next
year. We are unable to decide. Please advise us based
on inputs from experienced professionals.
We assume that the company will pay 6000 RMB to
a service with an IOI, and each agent for the IOI will
receive 1000 RMB if he/she responds to the question
with useful information. Furthermore, we assume that 5
agents respond; Table 1 lists the five responses.
6.2. Quantitative summarizing
When an IOI is employed to collect responses, we are
confronted with the following problems:
(1) Some agents may maliciously provide false
information in an attempt to discredit the online
service.
(2) Agents may provide inconsistent information as a
result of differing perspectives.
(3) The information may be incomplete because time
and the budget are limited.
The IOI will filter false information and
substantially inconsistent information. The information
remaining is called the effective information.
We assume that the responses in Table 1, which are
denoted as e1, e2, …, e5, contain useful information. For
example, e1= “Current information shows that global
warming will not significantly affect typhoon activity”.
Let Agent i, denoted as ai, summarize all of the
responses and give a summary Ei, as shown in Eq. (9). It
should be noted that Sumi will differ from Sum j
because of the different backgrounds of ai and aj.
1 2 5Sum { , , , }i iE e e e= (9)
To obtain structured data that will be analyzed using
the normal diffusion technique, the agents are required
to summarize the responses using Table 2, which is
designed to reduce the five uncertainties in the question
asked by the customer.
Table 1. Responses from 5 agents to the question of whether the risk of typhoon-related losses in Wenzhou is likely to increase.
Agent Discipline Response
Agent 1 Climatologist Current information shows that global warming will not significantly affect typhoon activity.
Agent 2 Meteorologist The records of typhoons that have affected Wenzhou show that the frequency of typhoons
has not significantly changed in recent years, but the intensity of the storms has increased.
Agent 3 Civil Affairs
Bureau staff
In Wenzhou, typhoon-related losses have increased approximately 5% per year in recent
years.
Agent 4 Statistics Bureau
staff in Wenzhou
The annual growth of Wenzhou's gross domestic product (GDP) is approximately 9%.
Typhoon-related losses show a decreasing trend.
Agent 5 Water Affairs
Bureau staff in
Wenzhou
The government has been investing heavily to improve drainage facilities. In the next five
years, the standard to prevent a flood will be raised from a return period of 30 years to 50
years.
Table 2. Questions for agents to quantitatively summarize responses.
1. Will global warming affect the typhoon risk in Wenzhou?
A. no information B. not at all C. slightly D. moderately E. significantly F. drastically
2. Will drainage facilities be improved?
A. no information B. not at all C. slightly D. moderately E. significantly F. drastically
3. In recent years, how did typhoon-related losses compare to GDP growth?
A. no information B. much lower C. slightly lower D. approximately the same E. slightly higher F. much higher
4. Is the typhoon risk decreasing?
A. no information B. no C. slightly D. moderately E. significantly F. drastically
5. What should the insurance company do next year?
A. no information B. do not sell policies C. more data required D. further analysis required E. prepare to sell policies F. sell
policies
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C.F. Huang
It is simple to transform a summary E into a five-
dimensional vector with the mapping function in Eq.
(10).
A 1
B 0.00
C 0.25
D 0.50
E 0.75
F 1
→ −⎧
⎪ →⎪
⎪ →⎪
⎨
→⎪
⎪ →
⎪
→⎪⎩
(10)
Let rij be the option of the ith agent to the jth
question. For example, Agent 1 chooses options C, E, C,
A, and E, respectively, to the five questions. The
summary E1 is thus the vector: 11 12 13 14 15( , , , , ) (0.25r r r r r =
, 0.75, 0.25, 1, 0.75)− . In this case, the matrix in Eq. (11)
shows all of the options of the agents for the five
questions.
11 12 13 14 15
21 22 23 24 25
31 32 33 34 35
41 42 43 44 45
51 52 53 54 55
0.25 0.75 0.25 1 0.75
1 0.75 0.5 0.25 0.75
(11)0.75 1 1 0.75 0.25
0.25 0.75 0.25 1 0.75
0 0.75 0.25 0.5 0.75
r r r r r
r r r r r
R r r r r r
r r r r r
r r r r r
−⎛ ⎞ ⎛ ⎞
⎜ ⎟ ⎜ ⎟−⎜ ⎟ ⎜ ⎟
⎜ ⎟ ⎜ ⎟= = −
⎜ ⎟ ⎜ ⎟
⎜ ⎟ ⎜ ⎟
⎜ ⎟⎜ ⎟
⎝ ⎠⎝ ⎠
6.3. Processing summaries with the normal
diffusion technique
The elements in the first column of R in Eq. (11) are
the responses to “Will global warming affect the
typhoon risk in Wenzhou? ” A comprehensive judgment
can be given by the normal diffusion technique with the
sample
1 11 21 31 41 51{ , , , , } {0.25, 1, 0.75, 0.25, 0}X r r r r r= = −
where “ 21 1r = − ” means in summary E2, Agent 2 did not
answer question 1. The available set of answers to the
questions is
1 11 31 41 51{ , , , } {0.25, 0.75, 0.25, 0}X r r r r′ = =
Using Eq. (5), we obtain the diffusion
coefficient 0.61095.0)-.750( 0.8146 ==h Then, 11r =
0.25 can be transformed into a fuzzy set as shown in
Fig. 7.
Similarly, we transform other elements in 1X ′ into
fuzzy sets. Summing the four membership functions, we
have the function
2 2 21.33955(0.25 ) 1.33955(0.75 ) 1.33955( ) 2 u u uf u e e e− − − − −= + +
The absolute maximum of the function is at (0.2925,
3.642). Therefore, the comprehensive judgment on
question 1 is u1=0.292506. This value is closest to
option C, namely, the answer is the following: Global
warming will affect the typhoon risk in Wenzhou slightly.
Furthermore, the other columns lead to the following
answers:
• Drainage facilities will be improved significantly.
• In recent years, typhoon-related losses were
slightly lower than GDP growth.
• The risk typhoon will significantly decrease.
• Prepare to sell policies next year.
7. Measuring the Effective Knowledge
When we use a statistical model to analyze a
relationship between two variables, the larger the
sample is, the more accurate the result; and the better
the statistical model is, the more reliable the result.
Similarly, the quality of service provided by an M-
IOI is determined by its effective knowledge and its
model M. The more effective knowledge is, the more
credible the answer given by the IOI; and the better the
model M is, the more reliable the answer.
In an M-IOI, the set E of effective information
shown in Eq. (2) will be provided by agents using their
experience and judgment. For E, we assume m agents
provide m summaries E1, E2, …, Em, which constitute a
summary set S shown in Eq. (12).
1 2{ , , , }mS E E E= (12)
When m=n, we suggest the following procedure to
measure the effective knowledge in an M-IOI.
First, we assume that a customer will pay an amount
of money G for a service using an IOI, and any agent
will receive compensation g if he/she provides useful
μ
-2 -1 1 2
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
Fig. 7. A comment quantified as r11=0.25 is transformed into
a fuzzy set using the normal diffusion function.
u
)
61095.02
)25.0(
exp()( 2
2
11 ×
−
−=
u
urμ
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Multiple Internet of Intelligences for Risk Analysis
information, where g, denoted as F,
consisting of a set A of agents, a network N used by A,
and a model M to process information provided by A.
When the intelligence level of F is greater than the
highest intelligence level of the individuals in A, F is
called a positive IOI, denoted as F↑.
In practice, the information in an IOI might be
heterogeneous, obtained from multiple sources. We
define a multiple Internet of intelligences (M-IOI) as the
processing of homological information in layers, which
allows the use of simpler models. In a summarizing M-
IOI, the agents are required to both provide and process
the information. The small samples from summaries are
optimally processed using the normal diffusion model to
generate an integrated answer that is more robust.
An example of typhoon-related insurance risk shows
that an M-IOI can predict for the customer, an insurance
company, whether the level of risk will increase
significantly. The methods reported in this study were
applied to an IOI assessing the demand for typhoon
insurance from the aquaculture industry in Wenzhou,
China. Readers interested in this online system may
refer to http://www.cazl.cn/ioi4ndra.
The Internet was based on the idea that there would
be multiple independent networks of rather arbitrary
design. As we now know, the Internet embodies a key
underlying technical idea, namely that of open
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C.F. Huang
architecture networking. The predecessor to the Internet,
the ARPANET, which was developed in the early 1970s
by the U.S. Department of Defense (Tanenbaum, 1996),
introduced several major innovations: email, the
electronic text messages exchanged by users; a remote
connection service for controlling a computer; and the
file transfer protocol (FTP), which allows information to
be sent from one computer to another in bulk. In the
early 1990s, the World Wide Web (WWW) was created
based on the Internet, a large and global TCP/IP
network.
ARPANET provided the starting point for
organizations to connect their computers. The web
allowed the enormous growth of all types of "people-to-
people" traffic. The evolution of the Internet is leading
to a digital translation of the physical world, enabling
the latter to be permanently connected. This is what is
called the Internet of things. The next step is the Internet
of intelligences. From the ARPANET to IOIs, the
development of Internet routing is shown in Fig. 8.
As Internet speeds increase, it will be possible to
share intelligences on a platform. The platform will be a
part of the global brain, defined as a network that is an
immensely complex, self-organizing system. A global
brain not only processes information but can also play
the role of a brain: making decisions, solving problems,
learning new connections, and discovering new ideas.
No individual, organization or machine is in control of
this system; its knowledge and intelligence are
distributed over all of its components (Heylighen,
2011). A global brain may be able to solve current and
emerging global problems that have eluded more
traditional approaches. At the same time, it will create
new technological and social challenges that are as yet
difficult to imagine. An IOI, as a part of a global brain,
might offer a viable platform to solve extremely
complex problems online through intelligent agents. A
global brain supported by many IOIs is shown in Fig. 9.
There is no doubt that existing mathematical tools
will not be sufficient to describe the future global brain.
More powerful mathematical tools beyond differential
calculus, probability theory and fractal theory will be
required. Fuzzy logic (Zadeh, 1965, 1975, 1996) could
be developed to support utilities to process flexible
information expressed in natural language. In the future,
a global brain could provide timely, effective and low-
cost analysis of risks, making the world safer.
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