In order to control a controlled object (1), such as a vacuum cleaner or washing machine signals are derived from a single sensor (4 or 5), which measures a single property of the controlled object (1), and are the signals used by a characteristic amount sampling unit (8) to derive a plurality of control characteristics. These are then processed by a neural network (15) to derive a basic control signal. The characteristics, or further characteristics derived from a further sensor (4) and a local condition detector are analysed by a fuzzy logic system (16) and used to modify the basis control signal. In other arrangements, the fuzzy logic is applied (60A, 60B, 60C, 60D) to each characteristic before the characteristics are applied to the neural network (15). Because the calculation time needed by the neural network (15) is long, it is possible to detect (50) if one of the characteristics has a particular volume (is within a predetermined range). Then, a fixed pattern may be derived, modified only by the fuzzy logic (16).