Dialogue Systems Require a Reactive Task Architecture

Natural language dialogue is one type of planning and task execution. Task execution typically requires that an agent be able to act reactively in its dynamic, unpredictable world. This is all the more true in dialogue planning and execution, in which agents’ goals and beliefs are often changing or opaque. Dialogue planning and execution is reactive in nature. Therefore, systems for dialogue interaction should have at their core a reactive task execution architecture. This paper was originally entitled “Dialog is task execution; task execution is best done reactively; therefore, dialog systems call for a reactive task execution architec-ture” Dialogue is task execution Throughout the history of natural language dialogue research, taking part in dialogue has been seen as a planful activity; that is, engaging in dialogue has been viewed (from various research perspectives) as an activity which involves agents ’ goals, and plans to achieve those goals. Engaging in a dialogue is engaging in a particular kind of task