Failure Mode
A specific, concrete way an AI decision could go wrong, stated precisely enough to be tested (not "the AI might be biased" but "the AI might score candidates from non-English schools lower"). Enumerated before any scoring.
Defined in 4 GAGE programs, which carry 5 distinct definitions of it. The wording above is taught in AI Literacy & Professional Conduct.
How each discipline defines it
The same term does different work depending on who is using it. These are the definitions as each program teaches them, unedited.
A specific way a component or function could fail, as distinct from the general fact that it might fail. A single component typically has more than one distinct failure mode; a motor can fail to turn, turn the wrong direction, or turn at the wrong speed, and each is analyzed separately.
A distinct way a system produces a bad output. Enumerating failure modes, rather than describing failure in general, is the core analytical act of this topic and is borrowed from safety engineering's Failure Mode and Effects Analysis.
A specific, concrete way an AI decision could go wrong, stated precisely enough to be tested (not "the AI might be biased" but "the AI might score candidates from non-English schools lower"). Enumerated before any scoring.
In this program's usage, one of the six specific, nameable, testable ways data quality can break; naming the specific failure mode is the diagnostic act that points to a specific fix.
A specific category or manner in which a system or component can fail. In this program, robot failures are sorted into four independent failure-mode categories: mechanical, sensor, software, and human.
Where it is taught
The exact lessons this term appears in. The first 7 topics of every program are free with a free account.
- Risk Assessment in AI Decisions · Critical Thinking and Context Engineering, AI Literacy & Professional Conduct
- The six failure modes of data quality, found live in your own warehouse · Quality as Physics, AI Data Governance: The Data Chair
- The license to govern: explaining to a skeptic exactly how your model fails · Build Before You Govern, AI Governance: Applied Mastery
Terms it appears with
Not an alphabetical neighbourhood: these are the terms taught in the same lessons, ranked by how often they appear together.