An Ontological-based Knowledge-Representation Formalism for Case-Based Argumentation

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10796-014-9524-3[EN] In open multi-agent systems, agents can enter or leave the system, interact, form societies, and have dependency relations with each other. In these systems, when agents have to collaborate or coordinate their activities to achieve their objectives, their different interests and preferences can come into conflict. Argumentation is a powerful technique to harmonise these conflicts. However, in many situations the social context of agents determines the way in which agents can argue to reach agreements. In this paper, we advance research in the computational representation of argumentation frameworks by proposing a new ontologicalbased, knowledge-representation formalism for the design of open MAS in which the participating software agents are able to manage and exchange arguments with each other taking into account the agents’ social context. This formalism is the core of a case-based argumentation framework for agent societies. In addition, we present an example of the performance of the formalism in a real domain that manages the requests received by the technicians of a call centre.This work is supported by the Spanish government grants [CONSOLIDER-INGENIO 2010 CSD2007-00022, TIN2011-27652-C03-01, and TIN2012-36586-C03-01] and by the GVA project [PROMETEO II/2013/019].Heras Barberá, SM.; Botti, V.; Julian Inglada, VJ. (2014). An Ontological-based Knowledge-Representation Formalism for Case-Based Argumentation. Information Systems Frontiers. 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10796-014-9524-3S120Amgoud, L. (2005). An argumentation-based model for reasoning about coalition structures. In 2nd international workshop on argumentation in multi-agent systems, argmas-05(pp. 1–12). Springer.Amgoud, L., Dimopolous, Y., Moraitis, P. (2007). A unified and general framework for argumentation-based negotiation. In 6th international joint conference on autonomous agents and multiagent systems, AAMAS-07. IFAAMAS.Atkinson, K., & Bench-Capon, T. (2008). Abstract argumentation scheme frameworks. In Proceedings of the 13th international conference on artificial intelligence: methodology, systems and applications, AIMSA-08, lecture notes in artificial intelligence (Vol. 5253, pp. 220–234). Springer.Aulinas, M., Tolchinsky, P., Turon, C., Poch, M., Cortés, U. (2012). Argumentation-based framework for industrial wastewater discharges management. Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence, 25(2), 317–325.Bench-Capon, T., & Atkinson, K. (2009). Argumentation in artificial intelligence, chap. abstract argumentation and values (pp. 45–64). Springer.Bench-Capon, T., & Sartor, G. (2003). A model of legal reasoning with cases incorporating theories and values. Artificial Intelligence, 150(1-2), 97–143.Bulling, N., Dix, J., Chesñevar, C.I. (2008). Modelling coalitions: ATL + argumentation. In Proceedings of the 7th international joint conference on autonomous agents and multiagent systems, AAMAS-08 (Vol. 2, pp. 681–688). ACM Press.Chesñevar, C., McGinnis, J., Modgil, S., Rahwan, I., Reed, C., Simari, G., South, M., Vreeswijk, G., Willmott, S. (2006). Towards an argument interchange format. The Knowledge Engineering Review, 21(4), 293–316.Diaz-Agudo, B., & Gonzalez-Calero, P.A. (2007). Ontologies: A handbook of principles, concepts and applications in information systems, integrated series in information systems, chap. an ontological approach to develop knowledge intensive cbr systems (Vol. 14, pp. 173–214). Springer.Dung, P.M. (1995). On the acceptability of arguments and its fundamental role in nonmonotonic reasoning, logic programming, and N -person games. Artificial Intelligence, 77, 321–357.Ferber, J., Gutknecht, O., Michel, F. (2004). From agents to organizations: An organizational view of multi-agent systems. In Agent-oriented software engineering VI, LNCS (Vol. 2935, pp. 214–230.) Springer-Verlag.Hadidi, N., Dimopolous, Y., Moraitis, P. (2010). Argumentative alternating offers. In 9th international conference on autonomous agents and multiagent systems, AAMAS-10 (pp. 441–448). IFAAMAS.Heras, S., Atkinson, K., Botti, V., Grasso, F., Julián, V., McBurney, P. (2010). How argumentation can enhance dialogues in social networks. In Proceedings of the 3rd international conference on computational models of argument, COMMA-10, frontiers in artificial intelligence and applications (Vol. 216, pp. 267–274). IOS Press.Heras, S., Botti, V., Julián, V. (2011). On a computational argumentation framework for agent societies. In Argumentation in multi-agent systems (pp. 123–140). Springer.Heras, S., Botti, V., Julián, V. (2012). Argument-based agreements in agent societies. Neurocomputing, 75(1), 156–162.Heras, S., Jordán, J., Botti, V., Julián, V. (2013). Argue to agree: A case-based argumentation approach. International Journal of Approximate Reasoning, 54(1), 82–108.Jordán, J., Heras, S., Julián, V. (2011). A customer support application using argumentation in multi-agent systems. In 14th international conference on information fusion (FUSION-11) (pp. 772– 778).Karunatillake, N.C. (2006). Argumentation-based negotiation in a social context. Ph.D. thesis, School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, UK.Karunatillake, N.C., Jennings, N.R., Rahwan, I., McBurney, P. (2009). Dialogue games that agents play within a society. Artificial Intelligence, 173(9-10), 935–981.Kraus, S., Sycara, K., Evenchik, A. (1998). Reaching agreements through argumentation: a logical model and implementation. Artificial Intelligence, 104, 1–69.López de Mántaras, R., McSherry, D., Bridge, D., Leake, D., Smyth, B., Craw, S., Faltings, B., Maher, M.L., Cox, M., Forbus, K., Keane, M., Watson, I. (2006). Retrieval, reuse, revision, and retention in CBR. The Knowledge Engineering Review, 20(3), 215–240.Luck, M., & McBurney, P. (2008). Computing as interaction: Agent and agreement technologies. In IEEE international conference on distributed human-machine systems. IEEE Press.Oliva, E., McBurney, P., Omicini, A. (2008). Co-argumentation artifact for agent societies. In 5th international workshop on argumentation in multi-agent systems, Argmas-08 (pp. 31–46). Springer.Ontañón, S., & Plaza, E. (2007). Learning and joint deliberation through argumentation in multi-agent systems. In 7th international conference on agents and multi-agent systems, AAMAS-07. ACM Press.Ontañón, S., & Plaza, E. (2009). Argumentation-based information exchange in prediction markets. In Argumentation in multi-agent systems, LNAI (vol. 5384, pp. 181–196). Springer.Parsons, S., Sierra, C., Jennings, N.R. (1998). Agents that reason and negotiate by arguing. Journal of Logic and Computation, 8(3), 261–292.Prakken, H. (2010). An abstract framework for argumentation with structured arguments. Argument and Computation, 1, 93–124.Prakken, H., Reed, C., Walton, D. (2005). Dialogues about the burden of proof. In Proceedings of the 10th international conference on artificial intelligence and law, ICAIL-05 (pp. 115–124). ACM Press.Sierra, C., Botti, V., Ossowski, S. (2011). Agreement computing. KI - Künstliche Intelligenz 10.1007/s13218-010-0070-y .Soh, L.K., & Tsatsoulis, C. (2005). A real-time negotiation model and a multi-agent sensor network implementation. Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, 11(3), 215–271.Walton, D., Reed, C., Macagno, F. (2008). Argumentation schemes. Cambridge University Press.Wardeh, M., Bench-Capon, T., Coenen, F.P. (2008). PISA - pooling information from several agents: Multiplayer argumentation from experience. In Proceedings of the 28th SGAI international conference on artificial intelligence, AI-2008 (pp. 133–146). Springer.Wardeh, M., Bench-Capon, T., Coenen, F.P. (2009). PADUA: A protocol for argumentation dialogue using association rules. AI and Law, 17(3), 183–215.Wardeh, M., Coenen, F., Bench-Capon, T. (2010). Arguing in groups. In 3rd international conference on computational models of argument, COMMA-10 (pp. 475–486). IOS Press.Willmott, S., Vreeswijk, G., Chesñevar, C., South, M., McGinnis, J., Modgil, S., Rahwan, I., Reed, C., Simari, G. (2006). Towards an argument interchange format for multi-agent systems. In 3rd international workshop on argumentation in multi-agent systems, ArgMAS-06 (pp. 17–34). Springer.Wyner, A., & Schneider, J. (2012). Arguing from a point of view. In Proceedings of the first international conference on agreement technologies

Human-Agent Decision-making: Combining Theory and Practice

Extensive work has been conducted both in game theory and logic to model strategic interaction. An important question is whether we can use these theories to design agents for interacting with people? On the one hand, they provide a formal design specification for agent strategies. On the other hand, people do not necessarily adhere to playing in accordance with these strategies, and their behavior is affected by a multitude of social and psychological factors. In this paper we will consider the question of whether strategies implied by theories of strategic behavior can be used by automated agents that interact proficiently with people. We will focus on automated agents that we built that need to interact with people in two negotiation settings: bargaining and deliberation. For bargaining we will study game-theory based equilibrium agents and for argumentation we will discuss logic-based argumentation theory. We will also consider security games and persuasion games and will discuss the benefits of using equilibrium based agents.Comment: In Proceedings TARK 2015, arXiv:1606.0729

Agreement technologies and their use in cloud computing environments

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13748-012-0031-9[EN] Nowadays, cloud computing is revolutionizing the services provided through the Internet to adapt itself in order to keep the quality of its services. Recent research foresees the advent of a new discipline of agent-based cloud computing systems that can make decisions about adaption in an uncertain environment. This paper discusses the role of argumentation in the next generation of agreement technologies and its use in cloud computing environments.This work is supported by the Spanish government (MICINN), project reference: TIN2012-36586-C03-01.Heras Barberá, SM.; De La Piedra, F.; Julian Inglada, VJ.; Rodríguez, S.; Botti Navarro, VJ.; Bajo, J.; Corchado, JM. (2012). Agreement technologies and their use in cloud computing environments. Progress in Artificial Intelligence. 1(4):277-290. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13748-012-0031-9S27729014European Comission: The Future of Cloud Computing. Technical report (2010)Barham, P., Dragovic, B., Fraser, K., Hand, S., Harris, T., Ho, A., Neugebauer, R., Pratt, I., Warfield, A.: Xen and the art of virtualization. In: SOSP03 Proceedings of the Nineteenth ACM Symposium on Operating Systems Principles, pp. 164–177. ACM, New York (2003)Wang, L., et. al.: Scientific cloud computing: early definition and experience. In: 10th IEEE International Conference on High Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC-08), pp. 825–830. IEEE Press (2008)Talia, D.: Clouds meet agents: toward intelligent cloud services. Internet Comput. IEEE 16(2), 78–81 (2012). doi: 10.1109/MIC.2012.28Heras, S.: Case-Based Argumentation Framework for Agent Societies. PhD thesis, Universitat Politècnica de València. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/12497 (2011)Ashton, K.: That ‘internet of things’ thing. RFID J. (2009). http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/view/4986Klusch, M.: Information agent technology for the Internet: a Survey. Data Knowl. Eng. 36, 337–372 (2001)Schaffer, H.E.: X as a Service. Cloud Computing, and the Need for Good Judgment IT Professional 11(5), 4–5 (2009). doi: 10.1109/MITP.2009.112Richardson, L., Ruby, S.: RESTful Web Services, Web services for the real world O’Reilly, Media, May, p. 454 (2007)GlusterFS Developers. The Gluster web site. http://www.gluster.org (2012)Chodorow, K., Dirolf, M.: The Definitive Guide. O’Reilly Media, MongoDB (2010)Fuentes-Fernandez, R., Hassan, S., Pavon, J., Galan, J.M., Lopez-Paredes, A.: Metamodels for role-driven agent-based modelling. Comput. Math. Organ. Theory 18(1), 91–112 (2012)Jordán, J., et al.: A customer support application using argumentation in multi-agent systems. In: 14th International Conference on, Information Fusion, pp. 772–778 (2011)Heras, S., Jordán, J., Botti, V., Julián, V.: Argue to agree: a case-based argumentation approach. Int. J. Approx. Reasoning (2012, in press)Walton, D., Reed, C., Macagno, F.: Argumentation Schemes. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2008)Bench-Capon, T., Sartor, G.: A model of legal reasoning with cases incorporating theories and values. Artif. Intell. 150(1–2), 97–143 (2003)Dignum, F., Weigand, H.: Communication and deontic logic. In: Information Systems Correctness and Reusability, pp. 242–260. World Scientific, Singapore (1995)Wooldridge, M., Jennings, N.R.: Intelligent agents: theory and practice. Knowl. Eng. Rev. 10(2), 115–152 (1995)Lopez-Rodriguez, I., Hernandez-Tejera, M.: Software agents as cloud computing services. In: 9th International Conference on Practical Applications of Agents and Multiagent Systems. Advances in Intelligent and Soft Computing, vol. 88, pp. 271–276. Springer, Berlin (2011)Sim, K.M.: Towards complex negotiation for cloud economy. In: 5th International Conference on Advances in Grid and Pervasive Computing. LNCS, vol. 6104, pp. 395–406. Springer, Berlin (2010)Aversa, R., et al.: Cloud agency: a mobile agent based cloud system. In: International Conference on Complex, Intelligent and Software Intensive Systems, pp. 132–137. IEEE Computer Society Press, Washington, DC (2010)Cao, B., et al.: A service-oriented qos-assured and multi-agent cloud computing architecture. In: 1st International Conference on Cloud Computing. LNCS, vol. 5931, pp. 644–649. Springer, Berlin (2009)Rahwan, I., Simari, G. (eds.): Argumentation in Artificial Intelligence. Springer, Berlin (2009

Towards real-time agreements

In this paper, we deal with the problem of real-time coordination with the more general approach of reaching real-time agreements in MAS. Concretely, this work proposes a real-time argumentation framework in an attempt to provide agents with the ability of engaging in argumentative dialogues and come with a solution for their underlying agreement process within a bounded period of time. The framework has been implemented and evaluated in the domain of a customer support application. Concretely, we consider a society of agents that act on behalf of a group of technicians that must solve problems in a Technology Management Centre (TMC) within a bounded time. This centre controls every process implicated in the provision of technological and customer support services to private or public organisations by means of a call centre. The contract signed between the TCM and the customer establishes penalties if the specified time is exceeded. 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.This work is supported by the Spanish Government grants TIN2009-13839-C03-01 [CONSOLIDER-INGENIO 2010 CSD2007-00022, and TIN2012-36586-C03-01] and by the GVA project [PRO-METEO 2008/051].Navarro Llácer, M.; Heras Barberá, SM.; Botti Navarro, VJ.; Julian Inglada, VJ. (2013). Towards real-time agreements. Expert Systems with Applications. 40(10):3906-3917. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eswa.2012.12.087S39063917401

Delivering services by building and running virtual organisations

Non peer reviewedPostprin

Case-Based Argumentation in Agent Societies

Hoy en día los sistemas informáticos complejos se pueden ven en términos de los servicios que ofrecen y las entidades que interactúan para proporcionar o consumir dichos servicios. Los sistemas multi-agente abiertos, donde los agentes pueden entrar o salir del sistema, interactuar y formar grupos (coaliciones de agentes u organizaciones) de forma dinámica para resolver problemas, han sido propuestos como una tecnología adecuada para implementar este nuevo paradigma informático. Sin embargo, el amplio dinamismo de estos sistemas requiere que los agentes tengan una forma de armonizar los conflictos que surgen cuando tienen que colaborar y coordinar sus actividades. En estas situaciones, los agentes necesitan un mecanismo para argumentar de forma eficiente (persuadir a otros agentes para que acepten sus puntos de vista, negociar los términos de un contrato, etc.) y poder llegar a acuerdos. La argumentación es un medio natural y efectivo para abordar los conflictos y contradicciones del conocimiento. Participando en diálogos argumentativos, los agentes pueden llegar a acuerdos con otros agentes. En un sistema multi-agente abierto, los agentes pueden formar sociedades que los vinculan a través de relaciones de dependencia. Estas relaciones pueden surgir de sus interacciones o estar predefinidas por el sistema. Además, los agentes pueden tener un conjunto de valores individuales o sociales, heredados de los grupos a los que pertenecen, que quieren promocionar. Las dependencias entre los agentes y los grupos a los que pertenecen y los valores individuales y sociales definen el contexto social del agente. Este contexto tiene una influencia decisiva en la forma en que un agente puede argumentar y llegar a acuerdos con otros agentes. Por tanto, el contexto social de los agentes debería tener una influencia decisiva en la representación computacional de sus argumentos y en el proceso de gestión de argumentos.Heras Barberá, SM. (2011). Case-Based Argumentation in Agent Societies [Tesis doctoral no publicada]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/12497Palanci

Argue to agree: A case-based argumentation approach

[EN] The capability of reaching agreements is a necessary feature that large computer systems where agents interoperate must include. In these systems, agents represent self-motivated entities that have a social context, including dependency relations among them, and different preferences and beliefs. Without agreement there is no cooperation and thus, complex tasks which require the interaction of agents with different points of view cannot be performed. In this work, we propose a case-based argumentation approach for Multi-Agent Systems where agents reach agreements by arguing and improve their argumentation skills from experience. A set of knowledge resources and a reasoning process that agents can use to manage their positions and arguments are presented. These elements are implemented and validated in a customer support application.This work is supported by the Spanish government grants [CONSOLIDER-INGENIO 2010 CSD2007-00022, TIN2008-04446, and TIN2009-13839-C03-01] and by the GVA project [PROMETEO 2008/051].Heras Barberá, SM.; Jordán Prunera, JM.; Botti, V.; Julian Inglada, VJ. (2013). Argue to agree: A case-based argumentation approach. International Journal of Approximate Reasoning. 54(1):82-108. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijar.2012.06.005S8210854

Case-based argumentation infrastructure for agent societies

In this work, we propose an infrastructure to develop and execute argumentative agents in an open multi-agent system. This infrastructure offers the necessary components to develop agents with argumentation capabilities, including the communication skills and the argumentation protocol, and it offers support for agent societies and their agents' social context. The main advantage of having this infrastructure is that it is possible to create agents with argumentation capabilities to resolve a specified problem. In the argumentation dialogue the agents try to reach an agreement about the best solution to apply for each proposed problem. The proposed infrastructure has been validated with a real example and it has been evaluated obtaining, with argumentation strategies, better performance than other reasoning approaches that do not include argumentation.Jordán Prunera, JM. (2011). Case-based argumentation infrastructure for agent societies. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/15362Archivo delegad