Cognition & Introspection

BDI Agent

Agent maintains explicit Beliefs about the world, Desires (goals), and Intentions (committed plans), and reasons by reconciling the three.

Problem

Implicit BDI is brittle. The agent loses track of which beliefs are current vs stale, which goals are still active vs satisfied, and which intentions it has committed to vs merely entertained. A new prompt can silently abandon a committed plan because the commitment was not represented as a typed thing. Without explicit BDI structures the agent has no vocabulary for 'I currently believe X, my goal is Y, and I am pursuing plan Z' that survives across prompts.

Solution

Maintain three typed stores: Beliefs (propositions about the world with currency timestamps), Desires (active goals with priorities), Intentions (committed plans with status and rationale). On each tick the agent (a) updates Beliefs from new observations, (b) re-evaluates Desires given new Beliefs, (c) checks Intentions for continued viability (still consistent with Beliefs and aligned with Desires), and (d) commits new Intentions or abandons existing ones explicitly. Each transition writes a trace entry. Distinct from a plain scratchpad: BDI structures are typed.

When to use

  • Long-running agent across many prompts where commitments must persist.
  • Goal conflicts and goal abandonment are common and need explicit treatment.
  • Operators need a vocabulary for the agent's beliefs, goals, and plans.

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