Knowledge processing and decision making in agent-based systems constitute the key components of intelligent machines. The contributions included in the book are: Innovations in Knowledge Processing and Decision Making in Agent-Based Systems Towards Real-World HTN Planning Agents Mobile Agent-Based System for Distributed Software Maintenance Software Agents in New Generation Networks: Towards the Automation of Telecom Processes Multi-agent Systems and Paraconsistent Knowledge An Agent-based Negotiation Platform for Collaborative Decision-Making in Construction Supply Chain An Event-Driven Algorithm for Agents at the Web A Generic Mobile Agent Framework Toward Ambient Intelligence Developing Actionable Trading Strategies Agent Uncertainty Model and Quantum Mechanics Representation Agent Transportation Layer Adaptation System Software Agents to Enable Service Composition through Negotiation Advanced Technology Towards Developing Decentralized Autonomous Flexible Manufacturing Systems

At the core of the many debates throughout cognitive science concerning how decisions are made are the processes governing the time course of preference formation and decision. From perceptual choices, such as whether the signal on a radar screen indicates an enemy missile or a spot on a CT scan indicates a tumor, to cognitive value-based decisions, such as selecting an agreeable flatmate or deciding the guilt of a defendant, significant and everyday decisions are dynamic over time. Phenomena such as decoy effects, preference reversals and order effects are still puzzling researchers. For example, in a legal context, jurors receive discrete pieces of evidence in sequence, and must integrate these pieces together to reach a singular verdict. From a standard Bayesian viewpoint the order in which people receive the evidence should not influence their final decision, and yet order effects seem a robust empirical phenomena in many decision contexts. Current research on how decisions unfold, especially in a dynamic environment, is advancing our theoretical understanding of decision making. This Research Topic aims to review and further explore the time course of a decision - from how prior beliefs are formed to how those beliefs are used and updated over time, towards the formation of preferences and choices and post-decision processes and effects. Research literatures encompassing varied approaches to the time-scale of decisions will be brought into scope: a) Speeded decisions (and post-decision processes) that require the accumulation of noisy and possibly non-stationary perceptual evidence (e.g., randomly moving dots stimuli), within a few seconds, with or without temporal uncertainty. b) Temporally-extended, value-based decisions that integrate feedback values (e.g., gambling machines) and internally-generated decision criteria (e.g., when one switches attention, selectively, between the various aspects of several choice alternatives). c) Temporally extended, belief-based decisions that build on the integration of evidence, which interacts with the decision maker's belief system, towards the updating of the beliefs and the formation of judgments and preferences (as in the legal context). Research that emphasizes theoretical concerns (including optimality analysis) and mechanisms underlying the decision process, both neural and cognitive, is presented, as well as research that combines experimental and computational levels of analysis.

This volume presents novel computational models for representing digital humans and their interactions with other virtual characters and meaningful environments. In this context, we describe efficient algorithms to animate, control, and author human-like agents having their own set of unique capabilities, personalities, and desires. We begin with the lowest level of footstep determination to steer agents in collision-free paths. Steering choices are controlled by navigation in complex environments, including multi-domain planning with dynamically changing situations. Virtual agents are given perceptual capabilities analogous to those of real people, including sound perception, multi-sense attention, and understanding of environment semantics which affect their behavior choices. The roles and impacts of individual attributes, such as memory and personality are explored. The animation challenges of integrating a number of simultaneous behavior and movement demands on an agent are addressed through an open source software system. Finally, the creation of stories and narratives with groups of agents subject to planning and environmental constraints culminates the presentation.

In our high technology society, there is a growing demand for a better understanding of decision making in high risk situations in order to improve selection, training and operational performance. Decision Making Under Stress presents a state-of-the-art review of psychological theory, in research and practice, on decision making in high pressure and emergency situations. It focuses on the experienced decision makers who deal with such risks, principally on flight decks, at civil emergencies, in industrial settings and military environments. The 29 chapters cover a wide range of perspectives and applications from aviation, military, industry and the emergency services. The authors, all international invited experts in their field, are based in research centers and universities from Europe, North America and Australia. Their common interest is in the theories and methods of a new research domain called NDM (naturalistic decision making). This volume comprises the edited contributions to the Third International NDM conference, sponsored by the US Army Research Institute and the US Naval Air Warfare Center, which was held in Aberdeen, Scotland in September 1996. The NDM researchers are interested in decision making in situations characterised by high risk, time pressure, uncertain goals, ambiguous information and teamwork. The extent to which the NDM approach can explain and predict human performance in such settings is a central theme, discussed with many practical examples and applications. This book is essential reading for applied psychologists, pilots, emergency commanders, military officers, high hazard managers, safety and emergency response professionals.

Path planning and navigation are indispensable components for controlling autonomous agents in interactive virtual worlds. Given the growing demands on the size and complexity of modern virtual worlds, a number of new techniques have been developed for achieving intelligent navigation for the next generation of interactive multi-agent simulations. This book reviews the evolution of several related techniques, starting from classical planning and computational geometry techniques and then gradually moving toward more advanced topics with focus on recent developments from the work of the authors. The covered topics range from discrete search and geometric representations to planning under different types of constraints and harnessing the power of graphics hardware in order to address Euclidean shortest paths and discrete search for multiple agents under limited time budgets. The use of planning algorithms beyond path planning is also discussed in the areas of crowd animation and whole-body motion planning for virtual characters.

Planning - formulating a course of action - and related fields like scheduling or reasoning about action have a long research tradition in artificial intelligence. However, there seems to have been a communications problem among European planners, with many of them unaware of good work done in neighboring countries. This volume contains ten papers presented at the European Workshop on Planning held in Sankt Augustin, Germany, March 1991. The purpose of the workshop was to provide a forum for presenting work in planning and related areas done by European researchers. The papers provide a snapshot of planning research at present being done in Europe. They describe work in the areas of plan generation, logical approaches to planning, planning under uncertainty, planning with time, and semantics of plans.

Rapidly changing market, technological, and organizational environments are forcing government and private sector enterprises to improve services and transform processes. Employing a case study approach, the Enterprise Dynamics Sourcebook presents frameworks and analytical models of the enterprise as a complex system to improve your understanding of its dynamic elements and their interactions. Illustrating the transformation environments and the evolution of methods required to address emerging challenges, this sourcebook is the product of MITRE-sponsored research on enterprise dynamics and the range of applications pertaining to enterprise transformation programs. It explains how to address the complexities involved with the coordination of policies, organizations, economics, and technology (POET) in operational strategies and processes. It also: Presents qualitative and quantitative data-analytic methods including process workflow, systems dynamics, and highly optimized tolerance-inspired models of SoSE processes Features Bayesian probability and state-space transition methods to address uncertainties in the controlled, influenced, and uncontrolled aspects of enterprise dynamics Explains how to use hybrid multi-scale modeling coupled with enterprise architecture to support decision making in the design, acquisition, and management of complex transformation efforts Outlines methods applicable in the national security, aviation, nuclear waste processing, international commerce, energy and materials, and healthcare sectors of the U.S. economy The structures and concepts covered in this book will be useful to managers and technical staff in government entities as well as private sector enterprises with significant operational and regulatory interaction with government entities. The enterprise dynamics methods discussed can help in the advancement of systems engineering practices at the enterprise level and also enable the enterprise systems engineering and architecting (ESE/A) process. Filled with examples, the text provides the understanding of the qualitative and quantitative data-analytic methods required to reduce risk and failure rates and enable your organization to operate effectively in today’s complex and ever-changing environment.

The proceedings of KR '94 comprise 55 papers on topics including deduction an search, description logics, theories of knowledge and belief, nonmonotonic reasoning and belief revision, action and time, planning and decision-making and reasoning about the physical world, and the relations between KR

Hailed on first publication as a compendium of foundational principles and cutting-edge research, The Human-Computer Interaction Handbook has become the gold standard reference in this field. Derived from select chapters of this groundbreaking resource, Human-Computer Interaction: Design Issues, Solutions, and Applications focuses on HCI from a pri