ABSTRACT

Engineers endow artifacts with abilities to cope with expected anomalies. The abilities may make the system robust. Humans at the front end, example, operators, and maintenance people are inherently adaptive and proactive; that allows them to accomplish better performances and, sometimes, even allows them to exhibit astonishing abilities in unexpected anomalies. However, this admirable human characteristic is a double-edged sword. Normally it works well, but sometimes it may lead to a disastrous end. Hence, a system relying on such human characteristics in an uncontrolled manner should not be called 'resilient'. A system should only be called 'resilient' when it is tuned in such a way that it can utilize its potential abilities, whether engineered features or acquired adaptive abilities, to the utmost extent and in a controlled manner, both in expected and unexpected situations.