Skip to main content

Part of the book series: Advances in Soft Computing ((AINSC,volume 28))

Summary

In some rescue or emergency situations, agents may act individually or on the basis of minimal coordination, while in others, full-fledged teamwork provides the only means for the rescue action to succeed. In such dynamic and often unpredictable situations agents’ awareness about their involvement becomes, on the one hand, crucial, but one can expect that it is only beliefs that can be obtained by means of communication and reasoning. A suitable level of communication should be naturally tuned to the circumstances. Thus in some situations individual belief may suffice, while in others everybody in a group should believe a fact or even the strongest notion of common belief is the relevant one.

Even though common knowledge cannot in general be established by communication, in this paper we present a procedure for establishing common beliefs in rescue situations by minimal communication. Because the low-level part of the procedure involves file transmission (e.g. by TCP or alternating-bit protocol), next to a general assumption on trust some additional assumptions on communication channels are needed. If in the considered situation communication is hampered to such an extent that establishing a common belief is not possible, creating a special kind of mutual intention (defined by us in other papers) within a rescue team may be of help.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Subscribe and save

Springer+ Basic
$34.99 /Month
  • Get 10 units per month
  • Download Article/Chapter or eBook
  • 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
  • Cancel anytime
Subscribe now

Buy Now

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Jennins, N.R., Sycara, K., Wooldridge, M.: A roadmap of agent research and development. Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems 1 (1998) 7–38

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Levesque, H., Cohen, P., Nunes, J.: On acting together. In: Proceedings Eighth National Conference on AI, AAAI-Press and MIT Press (1990) 94–99

    Google Scholar 

  3. Bratman, M: Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason. Harvard University Press, Cambridge (MA) (1987)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Fagin, R., Halpern, J., Moses, Y., Vardi, M.: Reasoning about Knowledge. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA (1995)

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  5. Meyer, J.J.C., van der Hoek, W.: Epistemic Logic for AI and Theoretical Computer Science. Cambridge University Press (1995)

    Google Scholar 

  6. Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R.: Calibrating collective commitments. In: Proceedings of the 3rd International Central and Eastern European Conference on Multi-Agent Systems. Volume 2691 of LNAI., Springer Verlag (2003) 73–83

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  7. Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R.: A tuning machine for cooperative problem solving. Fundamenta Informaticae to appear (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Steup, M.: The analysis of knowledge. In Zalta, E.N., ed.: The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. (Spring 2001)

    Google Scholar 

  9. van der Hoek, W., Verbrugge, R.: Epistemic logic: A survey. In Petrosjan, L., Mazalov, V, eds.: Game Theory and Applications. Nova Science Publishers, vol. 8, New York (2002) 53–94

    Google Scholar 

  10. Parikh, R., Krasucki, P.: Levels of knowledge in distributed computing. Sadhana: Proceedings of the Indian Academy of Sciences 17 (1992) 167–191

    MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  11. Halpern, J.Y., Moses, Y: Knowledge and common knowledge in a distributed environment. In: Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing. (1984) 50–61

    Google Scholar 

  12. van Ditmarsch, H., Kooi, B.: Unsuccessful updates. In: Proceedings of the 12th International Congress of Logic, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science (LMPS), Oviedo University Press (2003) 139–140

    Google Scholar 

  13. Halpern, J., Zuck, L.: A little knowledge goes a long way: Simple knowledge-based derivations and correctness proofs for a family of protocols. In: 6th ACM Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing. (1987) 268–280

    Google Scholar 

  14. Stulp, F., Verbrugge, R.: A knowledge-based algorithm for the internet protocol TCP. Bulletin of Economic Research 54 (2002) 69–94

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Castelfranchi, C, Tan, Y.H., eds.: Trust and Deception in Virtual Societies. Kluwer, Dordrecht (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R.: Dialogue in teamwork. In: Proceedings of The 10th ISPE International Conference on Concurrent Engineering: Research and Applications, Rotterdam, A.A. Balkema Publishers (2003) 121–128

    Google Scholar 

  17. Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R.: Collective intentions. Fundamenta Informaticae 51(3)(2002)271–295

    MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  18. Dignum, F., Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R.: Creating collective intention through dialogue. Logic Journal of the IGPL 9 (2001) 145–158

    Google Scholar 

  19. Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R.: A reconfiguration algorithm for distributed problem solving. Engineering Simulation 18 (2001) 227–246

    Google Scholar 

  20. Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R.: Evolution of collective commitments during team-work. Fundamenta Informaticae 56 (2003) 329–371

    MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  21. Clark, H.H., Marshall, C: Definite reference and mutual knowledge. In Joshi, A., Webber, B., Sag, I., eds.: Elements of Discourse Understanding, Cambridge University Press (1981) 10–63

    Google Scholar 

  22. Paurobally, S., Cunningham, J., Jennings, N.R.: Ensuring consistency in the joint beliefs of interacting agents. In: Proceedings of the second international joint conference on Autonomous agents and multiagent systems, ACM Press (2003) 662–669

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2005 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this paper

Cite this paper

Dunin-Keplicz, B., Verbrugge, R. (2005). Creating Common Beliefs in Rescue Situations. In: Monitoring, Security, and Rescue Techniques in Multiagent Systems. Advances in Soft Computing, vol 28. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-32370-8_5

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-32370-8_5

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-23245-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-32370-9

  • eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics