Agents have to be both autonomous and mobile in many WWW applications such as mobile computing. In this paper, we present ASS (Active State Space), a model of distributed supporting environments for autonomous mobile agents. We use ASS as a mediate media, which maps heterogeneous resources and knowledge representations into homogeneous virtual resources. In this manner, ASS is able to deal with...

Decentralized, partially or fully distributed multi-agent coordination, cooperation and coalition formation have been studied extensively over the past 20 years. Ensembles of autonomous software, robotic or other autonomous agents may need to coordinate and form coalitions in order to share resources, divide-and-conquer tasks, or enable themselves to complete tasks too complex for any individua...

The present paper investigates how embodied and situated agents perform tasks that require skills of categorization. The agents are artificially created by an adaptation process. The task is to categorize different shapes of objects using sensory-motor and linguistic input. Results show that the autonomous agents are able to solve the categorization task by integrating the sensory-motor experie...

In the paper we discuss variable and generative forms of autonomy. Variable autonomy is discussed in terms of the practicalities in designing autonomous agents, dealing as it does with the notion of degrees of autonomy and hence issues of agent control. The major part of the paper discusses an absolute, theoretically grounded notion of autonomy: the ability to generate one’s own goals. This the...

This paper provides an overview of the interactive autonomous agents currently being developed for the Charismatic system. The paper discusses the conversational requirements for agents within the system and provides an overview of the styles of conversational interaction which may be supported in similar systems where a user can talk to autonomous agents and avatars. The paper presents guideli...

This paper proposes a framework for autonomous self-interactive information systems, where each single information element is represented by a semi-active agent, and the autonomous information transformation is carried out through the interactions between agents representing information units. A concept of interaction distance and an interaction control mechanism are proposed to make the inform...

66 AI MAGAZINE Robots, and therefore roboticists, have been a part of the agents community from its auspicious beginnings in the Autonomous Agents series of conferences, and continuing with the merger into the Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (AAMAS) conferences. Today, there is a resurgent interest and recognition of the importance of robotics research framed within areas of research f...

This paper describes and frames a central ethical issue–the liability problem–facing the regulation of artificial computational agents, including artificial intelligence (AI) and robotic systems, as they become increasingly autonomous, and supersede current capabilities. While it frames the issue in legal terms of liability and culpability, these terms are deeply imbued and interconnected with ...

Transportable agents are autonomous programs. They can move through a heterogeneous network of computers migrating from host to host under their own control. They can sense the state of the network, monitor software conditions, and interact with other agents or resources. The network-sensing tools allow our agents to adapt to the network connguration and to navigate under the control of reactiv...

Autonomous robots or agents are known to be effective at dangerous tasks where the risk to human life is high or where tasks are overly repetitive. Some tasks where autonomous systems are know to be useful include space exploration [1], computer games [2]. Within many of these domains there are other agents that either compete, cooperate or unwittingly do one or the other. To be effective in su...