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Common aspects
The common aspects of the presented approaches towards a formal
framework for multi-agent simulation can be regarded as essential
aspects in the design of such a framework.
Situatedness within the environment
First of all, the importance of
the environment is regularly emphasized. This is somehow intuitively
clear, as the common definition of an agent usually contains the
concept of
situatedness
(e.g., [112, p. 32f.], [81, p. 7f.], [1,p.5]).
Especially Klugl advocates for explicit modeling of the environment
and favors the ideas laid down in [52]. Another common aspect is
that most approaches consider various types of entities within the
model. An obvious distinction is given by Klugl in separating the
entities (mutually exclusive) into agents and resources.
Distinction of active and passive entities
The distinction between
active and passive entities (i. e., agents and objects) is part of all
approaches. Furthermore, a very common aspect is the separation
of an agent into its body on the one hand and its mind on the other
hand [114, 69]. Consequently, the body or the physical properties
of an agent are perceptible by other agents, whereas the mind of an
agent is
private
in a sense, that usually just the agent itself has access
to it.
The passive entities ususally represent some objects from the real
world and are therefore associated with a couple of defining properties
which may well change respectively be altered during a simulation.
The main difference to the agents is that the passive entities do not
exhibit any behavior and do not actively influence a simulation in any
way.
Distinction between intended actions and actual outcome
The
importance of differentiating between the
intended action
of an agent
and the
execution of the action
is stressed by many authors. The
reason for this is that 'one must accept, that the agent itself can
