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MACHINE INTELLIGENCE 13

AI Classics

The two outstanding figures in the history of computer science are Alan Turing and John von Neumann, and they shared the view that logic was the key to understanding and automating computation. In particular, it was Turing who gave us in the mid-1930s the fundamental analysis, and the logical definition, of the concept of'computability by machine' and who discovered the surprising and beautiful basic fact that there exist universal machines which by suitable programming can be made to t This essay is an expanded and revised version of one entitled The Role of Logic in Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, which was completed in January 1992 (and was later published in the Proceedings of the Fifth Generation computer Systems 1992 Conference). Since completing that essay I have had the benefit of extremely helpful discussions on many of the details with Professor Donald Michie and Professor I. J. Good, both of whom knew Turing well during the war years at Bletchley Park. Professor J. A. N. Lee, whose knowledge of the literature and archives of the history of computing is encyclopedic, also provided additional information, some of which is still unpublished. Further light has very recently been shed on the von Neumann side of the story by Norman Macrae's excellent biography John von Neumann (Macrae 1992). Accordingly, it seemed appropriate to undertake a more complete and thorough version of the FGCS'92 essay, focussing somewhat more on the interesting historical and biographical issues. I am grateful to Donald Michie and Stephen Muggleton for inviting me to contribute such a'second edition' to the present volume, and I would also like to thank the Institute for New Computer Technology (ICOT) for kind permission to make use of the FGCS'92 essay in this way. 1 LOGIC, COMPUTERS, TURING, AND VON NEUMANN


Z.til

AI Classics

This paper describes some work on automatically generating finite counterexamples in topology, and the use of counterexamples to speed up proof discovery in intermediate analysis, and gives some examples theorems where human provers are aided in proof discovery by the use of examples.


A first-order formalisation of knowledge and action and action for a multi-agent planning system

AI Classics

We are interested in constructing a computer agent whose behaviour will be intelligent enough to perform cooperative tasks involving other agents like itself. The construction of such agents has been a major goal of artificial intelligence research. One of the key tasks such an agent must perform is to form plans to carry out its intentions in a complex world in which other planning agents also exist. To construct such agents, it will be necessary to address a number of issues that concern the interaction of knowledge, actions, and planning. Briefly stated, an agent at planning time must take into account what his future states of knowledge will be if he is to form plans that he can execute; and if he must incorporate the plans of other agents into his own, then he must also be able to reason about the knowledge and plans of other agents in an appropriate way.


Report 85 25 Decision Procedures . S Stanford Matthew L. Ginsberg May 1985

AI Classics

LOGIC CROUP KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS LABORATORY Department of Computer Science Stanford tIniversity Stanford, California 91305 Decision Precedures Abstract Distributed artificial intelligence is the study of how a group of individual intelligent agents can combine to solve a difficult global problem. This paper discusses in very general terms the problems of achieving this global goal by considering simpler, local subproblems; we drop the usual requirement that the agents working on the subproblems do not interact. We are led to a single assumption. An example of a distributed computation using these ideas is presented. Introduction The thrust of research in distributed artificial intelligence (DAI) is the investigation of the possibility of solving a difficult problem by presenting each of a variety of machines with simpler parts of it. The approach that has been taken has been to consider the problem of dividing tho original problem: what:,libtasks should be pursued at any given time? To which available machine should a..iven subtask be assigned? The question of how the individual machines should g9 about solving their subproblems has been left to the non-distributed Al community (or perhaps to a recursive application of DAI techniques). The assumption underlying this approach--that each of the agents involved in the solution of the subproblems can proceed independently of the others--has recently been called into question 12,3,6,7,101. It has been realized that, in a world of limited resources, it is inappropriate to dedicate a substantial fraction of those resources to each processor. The increasing attract:witless of parallel architectures in which processors share memory is an example of this: memory is a scarce resource. Automated factories must inevitably encounter similar difficulties. Are the robots working in such factories to be given distinct bins of component parts, and non-overlapping regions in which to work or to travel from one area of the factory to another?


Stanford Heuristic Programming Project December 1984 Report No. HPP-84-44

AI Classics

Thi3 framework generalizes previous work on cooperation without communication, and shows the ability of communication to resolve conflicts among agents having disparate goals. Using a deal-making mechanism, agents are able to coordinate and cooperate more easily than in the communication-free model. In addition, there are certain types of interactions where communication makes possible mutually beneficial activity that is otherwise impossible to:oordinate.


Cooperation without Communication

AI Classics

The single unifying assumption in this work is that one or more of the interacting agents will be using artificial intelligence techniques to guide their actions (including, of course, their communication actions). We call this the "intelligentagent paradigm." Within this broad categorization, the many individual efforts to give Al systems the capability to interact with other rational systems are seen as potentially increasing efficiency (by harnessing multiple reasoners to solve problems in parallel) or as necessitated by the distributed nature of the problem (e.g., distributed air traffic control


Communication and Cooperation Jeffrey S. Rosenschein Michael R. Genesereth *** REVISED DRAFT **

AI Classics

COMPUTER SCIENCE DEPARTMENT Stanford University Stanford, California 94305 Commu licaticn and Cooperation Abstract Intelligent agents need to coordinate their actions in pursuit of common goals. When communication is possible, cooperating agents must decide what information to pass in order to agree on a single course of action. This paper outlines several communication strategies (under monotonic and nonmonotonic planning assumptions), proving that some are convergent while others are not. An analysis is also made of the advantages of passing false information. Introduction Recent years have seen increasing interest in Distributed Artificial Intelligence (DAI) systems, that is, in groups of intelligent agents whose members cooperate in carrying out tasks. Considerable work has gone on in this area, producing a number of tentative approaches to cooperation; notable among these research efforts are Smith and Davis' work on the Contract Net [1], Davis' investigations of Cooperative Problem Solving strategies [2], Georgeff's approach to assuring non-interference among distinct agents' plans [3, 41, and Lesser and Corkill's empirical analyses of distributed computation 151. Despite some genuine insights that these researchers have gained, however, DAI has lacked much of the formal foundation needed for progress. Recent work by Appelt 161, Moore [7, 8] and Icon lige 19, 10, 11, 121 has begun to develop the formal descriptions necessary for one agent to reason about another agent's knowledge and beliefs; this is a key step in the development of successful DAI systems. This paper begins to lay the groundwork for another aspect of Distributed Artificial Intelligence's foundation; it presents a description and analysis of information pass:ng strategies between intelligent agents. Through use of a formal descriptive language, certain information passing behavior is proven to be convergent. In addition, an analysis is made of the role that can be played by the passing of false information, i.e., information that is logically inconsistent with the beliefs of the sender. Consider, for example, two individuals who have lost contact with each other in a department store [131.


Communication, Simulation and Intelligent Agent:: Implications of Personal Intelligent Machines for Medical Education

AI Classics

To appear inProc. of the American Association for Medical Systems & Informatics, 1983 Reprinted by permission of the American Association for Medical Systems and Informatics (AAMSI). Hardware advances in the next decade promise to make poss:*ale new medical educational technologies. New media for expressing, collecting, and sharing knowledge will provide students with means for coping with the increasing amounts of information. Novel means of graphically modelling physical phenomena--providing motivating and intuitively pleasing means for explorative interaction--could complement and sometimes replace traditional text material. Intelligent programs may serve as assistants, serving roles ranging from calculator to librarian to tutor, embracing a full range of secretarial and problen solving aids.