Modelling and design of multi-agent systems -- Is It an agent, or just a program?: A taxonomy for autonomous agents -- To be or not to be an “agent” -- What Is an agent? -- An agent is an individual that has consciousness -- Agents as a Rorschach test: A response to Franklin and Graesser -- From agent theory to agent construction: A case study -- If Z is the answer, what could the question possibly be? -- Practical theory and theory-based practice -- QLB: A quantified logic for belief -- Dynamic belief analysis -- Belief revision through the belief-function formalism in a multi-agent environment -- Formal specification of beliefs in multi-agent systems -- Reasoning about collective goals -- Formalisation of a cooperation model based on joint intentions -- A reactive-deliberative model of dialogue agency -- Towards layered dialogical agents -- A rational agent as the kernel of a cooperative spoken dialogue system: Implementing a logical theory of interaction -- Modelling social agents: Communication as action -- The threshold of cooperation among adaptive agents: Pavlov and the Stag Hunt -- How can an agent learn to negotiate? -- A cooperation model for autonomous agents -- Designing and implementing a multi-agent architecture for business process management -- Emotion-based attention shift in autonomous agents -- A deliberative and reactive diagnosis agent based on logic programming -- Reactive and motivational agents: Towards a collective minder -- A multi language environment to develop multi agent applications -- The design of a coordination language for multi-agent systems -- A knowledge-theoretic semantics for concurrent MetateM -- Knowledge-based situated agents among us a preliminary report.

Intelligent agents are computer systems that are capable of flexible autonomous action in dynamic, typically multi-agent domains. Over the past few years, the computer science community has begun to recognise that the technology of intelligent agents provides the key to solving a range of complex software application problems, for which traditional software engineering tools and techniques offer no solution. This book, the third in a series, represents the state of the art in the science of agent systems. It is based on papers presented at the 3rd workshop on Agent Theories, Architectures and Languages (ATAL'96), held in conjunction with the European Conference on Artificial Intelligence (ECAI'96) in Budapest, Hungary, in August 1996. It is essential reading for anyone interested in this vital new technology.