DECEMBER 2010 « IEEE CONTROL SYSTEMS MAGAZINE 19. LIGHT ON FUZZY ... a circle is a plane figure contained by one line, which is called the ...
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LIGHT ON FUZZY
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belong to the IEEE Control Systems Society. I recently read the April 2010 issue of IEEE Control Systems Magazine. I have also noted over time that
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MCS.2010.938484
attention of control engineers is not in fuzzy control. Is it that fuzzy control is not relevant? Why are experts not focusing on fuzzy control but only traditional control? If “nonphysical tools developed for systems and control are based on mathematics that we use to create algorithms that are embedded in computer programs that reside on circuit boards that run machines and processes that everyone depends on,” then embedded fuzzy control should deserve more attention. If “how well any control system operates depends on many facets of the technology, such as nonlin-
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earities, uncertainty, and noise,” then fuzzy control deserves more attention. I am interested in exploiting some ideas in the area of instrumentation and fuzzy control. What do you recommend? What are your comments? Why are control experts not focusing on fuzzy control? What are the inadequacies of fuzzy control? What is the likely future of fuzzy control? Thank you very much indeed for your response. Abayomi Ajofoyinbo University of Lagos
Laws of Geometry
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e bought “The Elements of Euclid,” a book twentythree centuries old. It began with definitions, such as: (1) A point is that which has no parts and which has no magnitude; (2) a line is length without breadth; (15) a circle is a plane figure contained by one line, which is called the circumference, and is such that all straight lines drawn from a certain point within the figure to the circumference are equal to one another; (16) and this point is called the centre of the circle. Also it began with Axioms or Common Notions: (1) Things which are equal to the same thing are equal to one another; (2) if equals be added to equals the wholes are equal; (3) if equals be taken from equals the remainders are equal; (4) if equals be added to unequals the wholes are unequal; (5) if equals be taken from unequals the
remainders are unequal; (6) things which are double of the same thing are equal to one another; (7) things which are halves of the same thing are equal to one another; (8) magnitudes which coincide with one another are equal to one another; (9) the whole is greater than its part; (10) two straight lines cannot enclose a space. Quietly, by himself, he worked with these definitions and axioms. The book, “The Elements of Euclid,” went into his carpetbag as he went out on the circuit. At night, when the other lawyers, two in a bed, eight and ten in a hotel room, he read Euclid by the light of a candle after others had dropped off to sleep. —C. Sandburg, Abraham Lincoln, The Prairie Years – 1, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1926, p. 473.
