Arguments over Co-operative Plans

Autonomous planning agents that share a common goal should be able to propose, justify and share information about plans. To reach an agreement on the best plan, strategies for persuasion and negotiation can be used by agents in order to share their beliefs about the world and resolve conflicts between the agents. We present an argumentation scheme and associated critical questions to create and justify plan proposals where plans are combinations of actions requiring several agents for their execution. An analysis of different ways in which actions can combine is presented and then associated with the argumentation scheme and the critical questions. We believe these elements are necessary to enable agents to engage in rational debate over co-operative plan proposals.