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Basic Mental Attitudes of a Collaborating Agent: Cognitive Primitives for MAS

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Book cover Multi-Agent System Engineering (MAAMAW 1999)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 1647))

Abstract

In this paper, we try to identify the relationships among three main (in our view) proposals of the basic mental attitudes in collaborative problem solving (the Toumela’s theory of acting together, in particular the notion of We-Intention; the Grosz and Kraus’ theory of collaboration, with special attention to the notion of Intention-that, and the Castelfranchi and Falcone’ theory of Delegation-Adoption). We show several overlaps, convergencies, but also complementarities, contradictions and competitions among these theories. The aim of this paper is some clarification and systematisation of the necessary mental attitudes in agents’ mind that characterise acting together and cooperating. We will not consider in this analysis other very important mental ingredients of complex forms of collaboration, like agents’ motivations in taking part in collective activity, trust, and normative components: permissions, rights, norms, roles, etc.

We would like to thank Maria Miceli and Frank Dignum for their comments. A special thank to Raimo Tuomela for his patient (although perhaps not completely successful) explanations. This research has been developed within the agreement between CNR and Provincia Autonoma di Trento, research project on “Applicazioni avanzate di informatica”.

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Castelfranchi, C., Falcone, R. (1999). Basic Mental Attitudes of a Collaborating Agent: Cognitive Primitives for MAS. In: Garijo, F.J., Boman, M. (eds) Multi-Agent System Engineering. MAAMAW 1999. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 1647. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-48437-X_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-48437-X_16

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

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