Imperatives, Commitment and Action: Towards a Constraint-based Model

The aim of this paper is to provide an analysis of the function of imperatives in dialogue. In particular, the focus is on the use of logically complex imperatives (e.g., ‘Say hello to John, if you meet him’) and temporal reference in imperatives (e.g., ‘Open the bottle of champagne at midnight’). Two specific problems involving logically complex and temporally referring imperatives are introduced. These problems are addressed within a framework for communicating agents. It is argued that such a framework needs to allow for partial models of communicating agents and their environment and for the intentionality of agent states.