Toward Bootstrap Learning of the Foundations of Commonsense Knowledge

Our goal is for an autonomous learning agent to acquire the knowledge that serves as the foundations of common sense from its own experience without outside guidance. This requires the agent to (1) learn the structure of its own sensors and effectors; (2) learn a model of space around itself; (3) learn to move effectively in that space; (4) identify and describe objects, as distinct from the static environment; (5) learn and represent actions for affecting those objects, including preconditions and postconditions, and so on. We will provide examples of progress we have made, and the roadmap we envision for future research.