traditional engineering design that is largely viewed as an exercise in problem solving. It

creates the distinction that engineering is aimed at creating information, which is related

to a specific decision, instead of knowledge, which is a set of agreed upon facts.

Considering design in this manner is commonly called systems engineering (Hazelrigg

1996).

 To develop a systems engineering approach independent of domain, Braha and

Maimon (1998) performed an extensive literature review that found engineering design to

share the following common properties:

* Design begins with an acknowledgement of an unmet need and a call for action to
 meet this need.

* Designing an artifact is used to transition from concepts and ideas to concrete
 descriptions.

* The designer is constantly faced with the problem of bounded rationality, i.e., the
 designer has limitations on his cognitive and information processing capabilities.

* The design specifications tend to evolve as part of the design process.

* Traditional engineering design methods tend to rely on satisfying rather than
 finding the true optimal solution.

* Alternatives and design solutions evolve as part of the design process.

 Braha and Maimon (1998) view design as a sequential process with feedback.

This process goes from general concept to preliminary and detailed design, production

planning, production, operation, and final disposal. Hazelrigg (1996, Page 8) viewed the

design process as

 three distinct activities: the identification of options, development of
 expectations on outcomes for each option, and use of values to select the option
 that has the range of outcomes and associated probabilities that are most desired.

 A key concept of Hazelrigg's view is the need to produce information that

provides a prediction of the accuracy or reliability of the design. Uncertainty is therefore