Intelligent systems as a discipline: a proposal for a restructuring of the field

The domain of application of artificial intelligence research and development has been split into a huge number of increasingly specialized fields. It is argued that a turning point in the specialization process has been reached, which provides the proof that a genuine science is being formed. This situation requires a new definition of the field of reference, of the discipline itself, of the hierarchy of sub-disciplines and of their socio-economical environment. Based on previous work on the epistemological and philosophical situation of mind techno-science, we introduce a method and its rules used for exhibiting that a new organization and practice of thought is possible. The rules consists of describing intelligent systems in terms of key concepts: structure, medium, design, function. The dissociation of these concepts help us show that IS technology introduces a new conception of structure. The structure of IS includes virtualities, some modalities of which only are perceived at the time of the instantiation of the corresponding artifact by a given subject. This situation and the reinterpretation required and here tentatively proposed indicate an important stage in the technological development of our societies. As the various fields listed concern all the main different aspects of our contemporary industrial societies, the present need and collective recognition of a unified field of knowledge of this technology shows the present state of the techno-infrastructure, which we call an infra-technology