In this podcast, Michael Stiefel spoke with Nimisha Asthagiri about the importance of system thinking, multi-agent systems, the consequences of society applying a technology into an area for which it was not designed, and whether we can ever have a healthy relationship with artificial intelligence.
 
System thinking emphasizes the importance of mental models, and how they relate to business requirements, and the architect's role in reconciling the different mental models of the participants in system design. In the area of multi-agent systems the discussion focused on how to scale such a system and control its autonomy in its relationship with humans. The discussion concludes with an exchange of views on our relationship with artificial intelligence, and the consequences of technology being used in areas for which it was never designed.

Read a transcript of this interview: http://bit.ly/487NPel

Subscribe to the Software Architects’ Newsletter for your monthly guide to the essential news and experience from industry peers on emerging patterns and technologies:
https://www.infoq.com/software-architects-newsletter 

Upcoming Events:

InfoQ Dev Summit Munich (October 15-16, 2025)
Essential insights on critical software development priorities.
https://devsummit.infoq.com/conference/munich2025

QCon San Francisco 2025 (November 17-21, 2025)
Get practical inspiration and best practices on emerging software trends directly from senior software developers at early adopter companies.
https://qconsf.com/ 

QCon AI New York 2025 (December 16-17, 2025)
https://ai.qconferences.com/

QCon London 2026 (March 16-19, 2026)
https://qconlondon.com/

The InfoQ Podcasts: 
Weekly inspiration to drive innovation and build great teams from senior software leaders. Listen to all our podcasts and read interview transcripts:

- The InfoQ Podcast https://www.infoq.com/podcasts/ 
- Engineering Culture Podcast by InfoQ https://www.infoq.com/podcasts/#engineering_culture 
- Generally AI: https://www.infoq.com/generally-ai-podcast/ 

Follow InfoQ:
- Mastodon: https://techhub.social/@infoq 
- X: https://x.com/InfoQ?from=@ 
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/infoq/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/InfoQdotcom#
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/infoqdotcom/?hl=en
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/infoq
- Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/infoq.com


Write for InfoQ: Learn and share the changes and innovations in professional software development.
- Join a community of experts.
- Increase your visibility.
- Grow your career.
https://www.infoq.com/write-for-infoq

Transcript

Mental Models in Architecture & Societal Views of Technology: A Conversation with Nimisha Asthagiri

Software engineers, architects and team leads have found inspiration to drive change and innovation in their team by listening to the weekly InfoQ Podcast. They have received essential information that helped them validate their software development map. We have achieved that by interviewing some of the top CTOs, engineers and technology directors from companies like Uber, Netflix and more. Over 1,200,000 downloads in the last 3 years.