Agency is the capacity to make and carry out decisions that affect an unfolding situation. In a delegative system, human agency is meaningful only when control returns early enough for the person to prevent or repair harm. section 9.2.2
Design delegative controls to preserve agency:
- Return control with sufficient time to respond, not after the system has made the outcome unavoidable. section 9.2.2
- Give the human genuine authority to make decisions that can avoid disaster. section 9.2.2
- Do not treat a delayed handoff as a failsafe for an inadequately demonstrated autonomous system. section 9.2.2
When control arrives too late
A nurse alerted only after a life-support failure causes cardiac arrest has no practical agency. Similarly, engaging an aircraft pilot after a control system has placed the aircraft into an unrecoverable stall turns delegation into failure. section 9.2.2
Figure 9.3 The control flow for a delegative remote control rover [1]
Trace the control flow of a delegative remote-control rover. section 9.2.2
