Multi-Agents Systems and Territory: Concepts, Methods and Applications

This paper analyses the multi-agents systems that are now considered the best tool to simulate and study real world. We review the main characteristics of a multi-agents system, namely interactions and cooperations of agents, communications and behaviours between them and finally the schedule of actions and jobs assignment to agents. The multi-agents system approach is increasingly applied in social and economic sciences; so we study mainly the territorial applications. In these applications new characteristics arise from the consideration of territory (land and space where the agents live or territory as an agent in itself, that evolves in the time). We study possible new applications of multi-agents applied to the territory (for instance, to define town planning policies or to locate dangerous facilities). Furthermore we study new tools to make operational multi-agents systems (mainly Swarm, the toolkit of Santa Fe Institute). With Swarm we present two kind of territorial applications: with located agents (fixed in space) and with not located agents (moving in the space). Finally we show the results of these applications.

The structure and logic of interdisciplinary research in agent-based social simulation

WOS:000222772400002 (Nº de Acesso Web of Science)This article reports an exploratory survey of the structure of interdisciplinary research in Agent-Based Social Simulation. One hundred and ninety six researchers participated in the survey completing an on-line questionnaire. The questionnaire had three distinct sections, a classification of research domains, a classification of models, and an inquiry into software requirements for designing simulation platforms. The survey results allowed us to disambiguate the variety of scientific goals and modus operandi of researchers with a reasonable level of detail, and to identify a classification of agent-based models used in simulation. In particular, in the interdisciplinary context of social-scientific modelling, agent-based computational modelling and computer engineering, we analyse the extent to which these paradigmatic models seem to be mutually instrumental in the field. We expect that our proposal may improve the viability of submitting, explaining and comparing agent-based simulations in articles, which is an important methodological requirement to consolidate the field. We also expect that it will motivate other proposals that could further validate, extend or change ours, in order to refine the classification with more types of models

Exploring the resource recovery potentials of municipal solid waste: a review of solid wastes composting in developing countries

Population explosion, high urbanization and improved living standards have induced rapid changes in quantities and materiacompositions of solid waste generation globally. Until recently solid waste disposal in landfills and open dump sites waconsidered more economical and it is the most widely used methods in developing countries. Hence the potentials in the othealternative methods such as the resource recovery and recycling and their integration into waste management have been scarcelassessed. However, the ever growing challenges posed by the rapidly increasing quantities and compositions of solid wastes ideveloping countries led to the searching for alternative waste disposal methods. In this regard the paper presented an assessmenof the resource potentials of municipal solid waste materials arising from cities in developing countries as a strategy fosustainable solid waste management. Using published data on solid waste composition the paper has identified that there is higpotentials of composting in the solid waste stream from cities in developing countries. In conclusion, it recommended the recoverof organic waste material and papers for composting and the recycling of plastic, metals, textiles and others to explore their resource recovery potentials. This will largely reduce the ultimate quantities of solid waste for disposal and lower the operatincosts. This strategy will achieve sustainable waste management in developing countries. It is hoped that the paper has provided useful guide for wastes management policy decisions in developing countries

A Review of Norms and Normative Multiagent Systems

Norms and normative multiagent systems have become the subjects of interest for many researchers. Such interest is caused by the need for agents to exploit the norms in enhancing their performance in a community. The term norm is used to characterize the behaviours of community members. The concept of normative multiagent systems is used to facilitate collaboration and coordination among social groups of agents. Many researches have been conducted on norms that investigate the fundamental concepts, definitions, classification, and types of norms and normative multiagent systems including normative architectures and normative processes. However, very few researches have been found to comprehensively study and analyze the literature in advancing the current state of norms and normative multiagent systems. Consequently, this paper attempts to present the current state of research on norms and normative multiagent systems and propose a norm’s life cycle model based on the review of the literature. Subsequently, this paper highlights the significant areas for future work

Coalition based approach for shop floor agility – a multiagent approach

Dissertation submitted for a PhD degree in Electrical Engineering, speciality of Robotics and Integrated Manufacturing from the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências e TecnologiaThis thesis addresses the problem of shop floor agility. In order to cope with the disturbances and uncertainties that characterise the current business scenarios faced by manufacturing companies, the capability of their shop floors needs to be improved quickly, such that these shop floors may be adapted, changed or become easily modifiable (shop floor reengineering). One of the critical elements in any shop floor reengineering process is the way the control/supervision architecture is changed or modified to accommodate for the new processes and equipment. This thesis, therefore, proposes an architecture to support the fast adaptation or changes in the control/supervision architecture. This architecture postulates that manufacturing systems are no more than compositions of modularised manufacturing components whose interactions when aggregated are governed by contractual mechanisms that favour configuration over reprogramming. A multiagent based reference architecture called Coalition Based Approach for Shop floor Agility – CoBASA, was created to support fast adaptation and changes of shop floor control architectures with minimal effort. The coalitions are composed of agentified manufacturing components (modules), whose relationships within the coalitions are governed by contracts that are configured whenever a coalition is established. Creating and changing a coalition do not involve programming effort because it only requires changes to the contract that regulates it

A Coherence Maximisation Process For Solving Normative Inconsistencies

Norms can be used in multi-agent systems for defining patterns of behaviour in terms of permissions, prohibitions and obligations that are addressed to agents playing a specific role. Agents may play different roles during their execution and they may even play different roles simultaneously. As a consequence, agents may be affected by inconsistent norms; e.g., an agent may be simultaneously obliged and forbidden to reach a given state of affairs. Dealing with this type of inconsistency is one of the main challenges of normative reasoning. Existing approaches tackle this problem by using a static and predefined order that determines which norm should prevail in the case where two norms are inconsistent. One main drawback of these proposals is that they allow only pairwise comparison of norms; it is not clear how agents may use the predefined order to select a subset of norms to abide by from a set of norms containing multiple inconsistencies. Furthermore, in dynamic and non-deterministic environments it can be difficult or even impossible to specify an order that resolves inconsistencies satisfactorily in all potential situations. In response to these two problems, we propose a mechanism with which an agent can dynamically compute a preference order over subsets of its competing norms by considering the coherence of its cognitive and normative elements. Our approach allows flexible resolution of normative inconsistencies, tailored to the current circumstances of the agent. Moreover, our solution can be used to determine norm prevalence among a set of norms containing multiple inconsistencies

Gaining Insight into Determinants of Physical Activity using Bayesian Network Learning

Contains fulltext : 228326pre.pdf (preprint version ) (Open Access) Contains fulltext : 228326pub.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)BNAIC/BeneLearn 202

Agenti (autonomi) normativi in società artificiali: uno studio simulativo sull'emergenza di artefatti sociali

Lo studio degli artefatti sociali, in particolare delle norme sociali, ha suscitato e suscita l'interesse di numerose e diverse comunità scientifiche. Tradizionalmente, filosofi, sociologi, giuristi e psicologi si sono interessati allo studio dell'origine delle norme e ai meccanismi socio-psicologici coinvolti nella adozione o trasgressione delle stesse; tuttavia, nell'ultimo ventennio questo interesse si è notevolmente allargato, influenzando la ricerca di settori scientifici più “duri” quali l'intelligenza artificiale, lo studio dei sistemi multi-agente, la teoria dei giochi e la robotica. Ognuno di questi ambiti disciplinari ha applicato il proprio approccio allo studio delle norme tentando di gettare luce sui meccanismi che sottendono: i) al comportamento coordinato che può emergere dall'adozione collettiva di una norma (o convenzione), ii) al processamento delle rappresentazioni mentali relative a regole sociali (quali le credenze normative), iii) all'influenza che il possesso o meno di norme può avere sul comportamento degli individui. Ciascuno di questi ambiti ha iniziato più o meno recentemente ad occuparsi dello studio delle norme; di conseguenza, alcuni di essi si trovano in una fase più matura, altri sono ancora in una fase iniziale (come senza dubbio la robotica, che da questo punto di vista rappresenta l'ultima arrivata). In questo lavoro, cercherò di mostrare come possa essere utile affrontare lo studio delle norme (di come esse si affermano socialmente, di come esse si insediano nella mente degli agenti, di come esse incidono sui comportamenti), utilizzando un approccio che per certi versi potremmo definire ibrido. Cercherò di conciliare due tradizioni contrapposte, provando a trarre il meglio da entrambe: la tradizione dell'approccio legato alla game theory, da un lato, e quello legato ai sistemi multi-agente, dall'altro.The study of social artefacts, including social norms, has aroused and attracted the attention of many different scientific communities. Traditionally, philosophers, sociologists, lawyers and psychologists are interested in studying the origin of norms and socio-psychological mechanisms involved in adoption or transgression of norms, but the last two decades this interest has expanded considerably, influencing research in scientific fields more "hard" as artificial intelligence, the study of multi-agent systems, game theory and robotics. Each of these disciplines have applied their approach to the study of norms attempting to clarify mechanisms underlying: i) coordinated behavior emerging from collective adoption of norm (or convention), ii) processing of mental representations relating to social rules (such as normative beliefs), iii) influence which the possession of norms may have on the individual behavior. Each of these fields began to study social norms more or less recently; some of them are in a more mature phase, others are still at an early stage (as robotics, the more young from this point of view). In this thesis, I will try to show how it can help tackle the study of norms (as they socially establish, how they install themselves in the minds of agents, how they affect behaviors), using an approach that in some ways we could define hybrid. I will try to reconcile two opposing traditions, trying to benefit from the best of both worlds: the traditional approach linked to game theory, on the one hand, and those related to multi-agent systems, on the other

From Social Monitoring to Normative Influence

This paper is intended to analyse the concepts involved in the phenomena of social monitoring and norm-based social influence for systems of normative agents. These are here defined as deliberative agents, representing norms and deciding upon them. Normative agents can use the norms to evaluate others' behaviours and, possibly, convince them to comply with norms. Normative agents contribute to the social dynamics of norms, and more specifically, of norm-based social control and influence. In fact, normative intelligence allows agents to Check the efficacy of the norms (the extent to which a norm is applied in the system in which it is in force), and possibly Urge their fellows to obey the norms. The following issues are addressed: What is norm-based control? Why and how do agents exercise control on one another? What role does it play in the spread of norms?Norms, Multi Agent Systems, Imitation, Social Control, Social Cognition