Title: Toward a Theory of Communication and Cooperation for Multiagent
Planning
Author: Eric Werner, Ph.D.
Contact: eric.werner@cellnomica.com
Abstract
In this paper we develop a formal computational theory of high-level
linguistic communication that serves as foundation for understanding cooperative
action in groups of autonomous agents. We do so by examining and describing
how messages effect the planning process and thereby relating communication
to the intentions of the agents. We start by developing an abstract formal
theory of knowledge representation based on the concept of information.
We distinguish two types of information: State information, which describes
the agent's knowledge about its world (knowing that) and process information,
which describes the agent's knowledge of how to achieve some goal (knowing
how). These two types of information are then used to formally define
the agent's representation of knowledge states including the agent's intentional
states. We then show how situations and actions are related to the knowledge
states. Using these relations we define a formal situation semantics for
a propositional language. Based on this semantics, a formal pragmatic
interpretation of the language is defined that formally describes how
any given knowledge representational state is modified by a given message.
Finally, using this theory of meaning of messages or speech acts, a theory
of cooperation by means of communication is described.
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