Corrigibility

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The quality of being open to correction, guidance, or reform, especially in how a system or agent accepts changes to its behavior
2. The willingness of a person, organization, or artificial system to accept adjustments and instruction from others without resisting them
3. Readiness to be redirected or amended when errors are pointed out, so that behavior can be altered by legitimate oversight

Etymology: "Corrigibility" is a plain formation: the adjective "corrigible," meaning capable of being corrected or reformed, with the suffix "-ity" added to turn a quality into a noun. "Corrigible" itself comes from the Latin "corrigere," meaning to correct, a compound of "com-" (intensive, here sense of thoroughly) and "regere" (to make straight or rule), so the underlying idea is making something straight again. The word's modern prominence owes more to recent discussions of artificial intelligence, where it describes whether a system will accept correction or shutdown from its designers. Its older sense, the quality of being open to reform, is the one the suffix was built to express.

Synonyms: correctability, amenability, docility, tractability

Antonyms: intractability, incorrigibility, obstinacy