N-Jason: Run-Time Norm Compliance in AgentSpeak(L)

Abstract

Abstract. Normative systems offer a means to govern agent behaviour in dynamic open environments. Under the governance, agents themselves must be able to reason about compliance with state-or event-based norms (or both) depending upon the formalism used. This paper describes how norm awareness enables a BDI agent to exhibit norm compliant behaviour at run-time taking into account normative factors. To this end, we propose N-Jason, a run-time norm compliant BDI agent framework supporting norm-aware deliberation as well as run-time norm execution mechanism, through which new unknown norms are recognised and bring about the triggering of plans. To be able to process a norm such as an obligation, the agent architecture must be able to deal with deadlines and priorities, and choose between plans triggered by a particular norm. Consequently, we extend the syntax and the scheduling algorithm of AgentSpeak(RT) to operate in the context of Jason/AgentSpeak(L) and provide 'real-time agency', which we explain through a detailed examination of the operational semantics of a single reasoning cycle.

Norm emergence in multiagent systems: a viewpoint paper

“…Agent societies with an explicit representation commonly have an internal representation of norms in the beliefs of the agent, such as with BDI agents, examples of which include Beheshti [15], Morales et al [73], Conte and Castelfranchi [32]. There are other cases where there is an external representation of the norm in a distinct location, which represents the normative system implemented as a common knowledge source that can be referenced [31,58,61]. Additionally, there are agent societies where there is both an internal and an external representation of the norms for example, Boella and van der Torre [19] and dos Santos Neto et al [41].…”

“…Norm emergence or convergence is widely accepted to have happened, or a norm is said to have emerged, when a predetermined percentage of the population observes the Balaraman and Singh [13] Beheshti and Sukthankar [16] Beheshti et al [17] Bench-Capon and Modgil [18] Boissier et al [22] Boella and van der Torre [20] Boella and van der Torre [19] Boyd and Richerson [23] Broersen et al [24] Brooks et al [25] Campos et al [26] Chakrabarti and Basu [28] Chao Yu et al [29] Cliffe et al [31] Conte and Castelfranchi [32] Criado et al [35] Dascalu et al [37] Dastani and van der Torre [38] dos Santos Neto et al [41] Franks et al [42] Frantz et al [43] Ghorbani et al [48] Ghorbani and Bravo [46] Hoffmann [55] Hofmann et al [56] Hassani-Mahmooei and Parris [53] Hao and Leung [49] Hao et al [50] Hao et al [51] Hao et al [52] Hu and Leung [57] Hübner et al [58] Lopez [65] Lotzmann et al [66] Lee et al [61] Mahmoud et al [67] Mashayekhi et al [68] Mukherjee et al [75] Mungovan et al [76] Morales et al [70] Morales et al [72] Morales et al [71] Mor...…”

A Situational Awareness Approach to Intelligent Vehicle Agents

“…1 Illustration of available BSF system components participants (e.g. for a vehicle to slow down, or move out of the way), following the principles set out in [23] and developed for Jason in [24].…”

Social Coordination Frameworks for Social Technical Systems

“…traffic simulation in SUMO) [15]. Lessons learned: External norms in combination with an agent architecture that is capable of incorporating detached norms (i.e., obligations and permissions) into its rea-soning [60] provide a flexible mechanism for directing agent behaviour without postdeployment reprogramming and account for behaviours that were not known at the time the agent was designed. This flexibility is however inevitably limited to behaviours that can be composed from the repertoire of actions of the agent.…”

“…To address this problem, we use the concept of an external, explicit representation of norms (which we call an institution), in which norms (obligations, permissions) are detached (instantiated) in response to agent actions and delivered to an agent as percepts that can be incorporated into their belief base and hence into agents's decision-making. Thus in the Second Life scenario, the agents are provided by the Jason [24] agent platform and the BDI interpreter is extended to reason about norms and priorities [60], enabling the agent to switch between conventional politeness -affecting inter-personal distance and group movement behaviour, for example -when acting as a tour guide, to directing visitors when an emergency occurs -when moving with a given tour group and not mixing with other tour groups is no longer appropriate. The SUMO simulation scenario is enriched by the use of multiple interacting institutions, that have different but related competencies, to handle a road traffic accident in the slow lane of a three-lane motorway [13], namely (i) the group of vehicles involved in the crash (ii) the emergency services (iii) the insurance companies of the group of vehicles, and (iv) motorway management, which handles activities such as lane merging.…”