Modelling Trust in Artificial Agents, A First Step Toward the Analysis of e-Trust

This paper provides a new analysis of e-trust, trust occurring in digital contexts, among the artificial agents of a distributed artificial system. The analysis endorses a non-psychological approach and rests on a Kantian regulative ideal of a rational agent, able to choose the best option for itself, given a specific scenario and a goal to achieve. The paper first introduces e-trust describing its relevance for the contemporary society and then presents a new theoretical analysis of this phenomenon. The analysis first focuses on an agent’s trustworthiness, this one is presented as the necessary requirement for e-trust to occur. Then, a new definition of e-trust as a second-order-property of first-order relations is presented. It is shown that the second-order-property of e-trust has the effect of minimising an agent’s effort and commitment in the achievement of a given goal. On this basis, a method is provided for the objective assessment of the levels of e-trust occurring among the artificial agents of a distributed artificial system.

[1]  Olli Lagenspetz,et al.  Legitimacy and Trust , 1992 .

[2]  Robert Cavalier.  The Impact Of The Internet On Our Moral Lives , 2005 .

[3]  Marianne Winslett,et al.  Protecting Privacy during On-Line Trust Negotiation , 2002, Privacy Enhancing Technologies.

[4]  Rino Falcone,et al.  Principles of trust for MAS: cognitive anatomy, social importance, and quantification , 1998, Proceedings International Conference on Multi Agent Systems (Cat. No.98EX160).

[5]  Mariarosaria Taddeo,et al.  Defining Trust and E-Trust: From Old Theories to New Problems , 2009, Int. J. Technol. Hum. Interact..

[6]  Maj Tuomela,et al.  Simulating rational social normative trust, predictive trust, and predictive reliance between agents , 2003, Ethics and Information Technology.

[7]  N. Luhmann.  Trust and Power , 1979 .

[8]  Peter de Vries,et al.  Social Presence as a Conduit to the Social Dimensions of Online Trust , 2006, PERSUASIVE.

[9]  Michael Wooldridge,et al.  Introduction to multiagent systems , 2001 .

[10]  Luciano Floridi,et al.  The Method of Levels of Abstraction , 2008, Minds and Machines.

[11]  Diego Gambetta.  Can We Trust Trust , 2000 .

[12]  Carleen Maitland,et al.  Trust in cyberspace , 2000 .

[13]  Pattie Maes,et al.  Agent-mediated Electronic Commerce : A Survey , 1998 .

[14]  Panagiota Papadopoulou,et al.  Applying virtual reality for trust-building e-commerce environments , 2007, Virtual Reality.

[15]  Luciano Floridi,et al.  On the Morality of Artificial Agents , 2004, Minds and Machines.

[16]  Amy E. White.  The Impact of the Internet on Our Moral Lives , 2007 .

[17]  Susan Wiedenbeck,et al.  On-line trust: concepts, evolving themes, a model , 2003, Int. J. Hum. Comput. Stud..

[18]  Pattie Maes,et al.  Agent-mediated electronic commerce: issues, challenges and some viewpoints , 1998, AGENTS '98.

[19]  D. Collard,et al.  Trust : making and breaking cooperative relations , 1989 .

[20]  F. Schneider.  Trust in Cyberspace , 1998 .