What Does An Agent Look like?
Agents can be representations of any type of autonomous entity. These could be, for example, people, buildings, cars, land parcels, water droplets or insects. Figure 5.1 shows the similarities between the concept of (i) a “social” human and (ii) a grocery retailer and of a representation of an agent within an object-orientated program (see Abdou et
Rules, Behaviour and Relationships
Each of the inanimate and animate agents outlined above can possess rules that will affect their behaviour and relationships with other agents and/or their surrounding environment. Rules are typically derived from published literature, expert knowledge, data analysis or numerical work and are the foundation of an agent’s behaviour. One rule-set can
Agent Environments
Environments define the space in which agents operate, serving to support their interaction with the environment and other agents. For example, depending on the space defined for agent interactions, proximity may be defined by spatial distance for continuous space, adjacency for grid cells, or by connectivity in social networks. Agents within an en
