Conventional Signalling Acts and Conversation

This article aims to provide foundations for a new approach to Agent Communication Languages (ACLs). First, we present the theory of signalling acts. In contrast to current approaches to communication, this account is neither intention-based nor committment-based, but conventionbased. Next, we explore ways of embedding that theory within an account of conversation. We move here from an account of the basic types of communicative act (the statics of communication) to an account of their role in sequences of exchanges in communicative interaction (the dynamics of communication). Finally, we apply the framework to the analysis of conversational protocols such as the English auction protocol. We propose to give a compact expression of conversation protocols by means of a formula of the object-language. We also use this kind of representation to provide the basis for a procedure for keeping a record of the conventional effects achieved in a conversation. £A preliminary version of this wor...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2003
• Where: AGENTCL
• Authors: Andrew J. I. Jones, Xavier Parent
• Keywords: Agent Communication Language, AGENTCL 2003, Communications, Conversation Protocols, English Auction Protocol