Abstract
An agent may decide to delegate tasks to others. The act of delegating a task by one autonomous agent to another can be carried out by the performance of one or more imperative communication acts. In this paper, the semantics of imperatives are specified using a language of actions and states. It is further shown how the model can be used to distinguish between whole-hearted and mere extensional satisfaction of an imperative, and how this may be used to specify the semantics of imperatives in agent communication languages.
Keywords
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
References
L. Åqvist. A new approach to the logical theory of interrogatives. Tubingen, TBL Verlag Gunter Barr, 1975.
J.L. Austin. How to do things with words. Oxford University Press, 1962.
M. Barbuceanu and M. S. Fox. Integrating communicative action, conversations and decision theory to coordinate agents. In Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Autonomous Agents, pages 47–58, 1997.
C. Castelfranchi. Modelling social action for AI agents. Artificial Intelligence, 103:157–182, 1998.
B. F. Chellas. Modal logic: An introduction. Cambridge University Press, 1980.
P. R. Cohen and H. J. Levesque. Communicative actions for artificial agents. In Proceedings of the First International Conference on Multi-Agent Systems, pages 65–72, 1995.
F. Dignum. Using transactions in integrity constraints: Looking forward or backwards, what is the difference? In Proceedings of the Workshop on Applied Logics, 1992.
T. Finin, D. McKay, R. Fritzson, and R. McEntire. KQML: An information and knowledge exchange protocol. In K. Funchi and T. Yokoi, editors, Knowledge Building and Knowledge Sharing. Ohmsha and IOS Press, 1994.
H. P. Grice. Meaning. Philosophical review, 66:377–388, 1957.
C. L. Hamblin. Imperatives. Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1987.
H. L. A. Hart. Bentham on legal rights. In A. W. B. Simpson, editor, Oxford Essays in Jurisprudence, 2, pages 171–201. Oxford University Press, 1973.
J. Hintikka, I. Halonen, and A. Mutanen. Interrogative logic as a general theory of reasoning. unpublished manuscript, 1996.
A. I. J. Jones and M. J. Sergot. A formal characterisation of institutionalised power. Journal of the IGPL, 4(3):429–445, 1996.
L. Lindahl. Position and change: A study in law and logic. D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, 1977.
J. McCarthy and P. Hayes. Some philosophical problems from the standpoint of artificial intelligence. In D. Michie and B. Meltzer, editors, Machine Intelligence, volume 4, pages 463–502. Edinburgh University Press, 1969.
A. Newell. The knowledge level. Artificial Intelligence, 18:87–127, 1982.
P. Panzarasa, T. J. Norman, and N. R. Jennings. Modeling sociality in the BDI framework. In J. Lui and N. Zhong, editors, Proceedings of the First Asia-Pacific Conference on Intelligent Agent Technology.World Scientific Publishing, 1999.
I. Pörn. The logic of power. Basil Blackwell, 1970.
C. A. Reed. Dialogue frames on agent communication. In Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Multi-Agent Systems, pages 246–253, 1998.
J. R. Searle. Speech acts: An essay in the philosophy of language. Cambridge University Press, 1969.
M. J. Sergot. Normative positions. In P. McNamara and H. Prakken, editors, Norms, Logics and Information Systems. ISO Press, 1998.
M. Shanahan. Solving the frame problem. MIT Press, 1997.
I. A. Smith, P. R. Cohen, J. M. Bradshaw, M. Greaves, and H. Holmback. Designing conversation policies using joint intention theory. In Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Multi-Agent Systems, pages 269–276, 1998.
G. H. von Wright. An essay in deontic logic and the general theory of action, volume 21 of Acta philosophica Fennica. North-Holland, Amsterdam, 1968.
D. N. Walton and E. C.W. Krabbe. Commitment in dialogue: Basic concepts of interpersonal reasoning. SUNY, NewYork, 1995.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2001 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Norman, T.J., Reed, C. (2001). Delegation and Responsibility. In: Castelfranchi, C., Lespérance, Y. (eds) Intelligent Agents VII Agent Theories Architectures and Languages. ATAL 2000. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 1986. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44631-1_10
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44631-1_10
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-42422-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-44631-6
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive