Abstract
The so-called sincerity condition, that an agent believes what it communicates, is often specified as a semantic condition on performing a declarative type of speech act in an Agent Communication Language (ACL). We argue that the sincerity condition should not be part of the normative standard semantics of an ACL, although it is useful as an informative guideline for co-operating agents. We need instead to distinguish the meaning of the declarative performative in isolation from its meaning as used in the context of a conversation or application. As a result, we can begin to appreciate some of the legal implications underlying agent communications.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Cohen, P., Levesque, H.: Rational Interaction as the basis for Communication. In: Cohen, P., Morgan, J., Pollack, M. (eds.) Intentions in Communication. MIT Press, Cambridge (1990)
Castelfranchi, C., Tan, Y.H., Falcone, R., Firozabadi, B. (eds.): Deception, Fraud and Trust in Agent Societies. Workshop 7, Autonomous Agents AA 1999, Seattle (1999)
Evans, E.P.: The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals. E.P. Dutton, New York (1906); Reprinted The Lawbook Exchange Ltd (1998)
FIPA, FIPA 1997 Specification Part 2: Agent Communication Language. FIPA (Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents) (November 28, 1997), http://drogo.cselt.stet.it/fipa/
Finin, T., Labrou, Y., Mayfield, J.: KQML as an agent communication language. In: Bradshaw, J. (ed.) Software Agents. MIT Press, Cambridge (1995)
Heckman, C., Wobbrock, J.: Liability for Autonomous Agent Design. In: Proceedings Autonomus Agents AA 1998, pp. 392–399 (1998)
Jones, A., Sadighi Firozabadi, B.: On the Characterisation of a Trusting Agent: Aspects of a Formal Approach (to appear)
Labrou, Y., Finin, T.: Semantics for an Agent Communication Language. In: Rao, A., Singh, M.P., Wooldridge, M.J. (eds.) ATAL 1997. LNCS, vol. 1365. Springer, Heidelberg (1998)
Pitt, J., Mamdani, A.: A Protocol-Based Semantics for an Agent Communication Language. In: Accepted for publication in Proceedings 16th International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Stockholm, Sweden (1999) (to appear)
Pitt, J., Mamdani, A.: Some Remarks on the Semantics of FIPA’s Agent Communication Language. Accepted for publication in Journal of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems. Kluwer Academic Press, Dordrecht (to appear)
Rosenschein, J., Zlotkin, G.: Rules of Enounter. MIT Press, Cambridge (1998)
Sandholm, T.: Agents in Electronic Commerce: Component Technologies for Automated Negotiation and Coalition Formation. In: Klusch, M., Weiss, G. (eds.) CIA 1998. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1435, pp. 113–134. Springer, Heidelberg (1998)
Singh, M.: Agent Communication Languages: Rethinking the Principles. IEEE Computer, 40–47 (Decembe 1998)
Wellman, M., Wurman, P.: Market-aware agents for a multiagent world. Robotics and Autonomous Systems 24, 115–125 (1998)
Wooldridge, M.: Verifiable Semantics for Agent Communication Languages. In: Proceedings ICMAS 1998, Paris, France (1998)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2000 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Pitt, J., Mamdani, A. (2000). Some Legal Aspects of Inter-agent Communication: From the Sincerity Condition to ‘Ethical’ Agents. In: Dignum, F., Greaves, M. (eds) Issues in Agent Communication. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 1916. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/10722777_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/10722777_4
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-41144-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-40028-8
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive