The Unknowable Software Product: Essences, Accidents, and Consequences of Software with AI-in-the-Loop

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Forty years ago, Fred Brooks considered the essence (what is intrinsic to a thing) andaccident (removable without altering the thing fundamentally) of software. When AI is inthe software development loop, properties of software arise that fit neither of these categories:non-determinism, opacity, and emergence. We term these consequences, a third category distinctfrom essence and accident, and argue that naming them is a precondition for managing them insoftware engineering practice and research.