Autonomous System Reference Framework and Early Design Decisions

System autonomy assessment tools and methodologies are not consistent across the Department of Defense (DoD). The Defense Science Board was tasked to review current "Levels of Autonomy" assessment methods and concluded that they are counterproductive to the autonomy design process as the focus is on the computer and not on the collaboration between the computer and its operator/supervisor. The Defense Science Board recommended that the DoD abandon the debate over definitions of levels of autonomy and embrace a three-facet Autonomous Systems Reference Framework to replace "Levels of Autonomy". We developed our contribution to such a framework and described it in this paper.