Issues in Communication Game

Issues in Communication Game HASIDA K6iti Electrotechnical Laboratory 1-1-4 Umezono, Tukuba, Ibaraki 305, Japan. hasida@etl.go.jp Abstract As interaction between autonomous agents, communication can be analyzed in game-theoretic terms. Meaning game is proposed to formalize the core of intended communication in which the sender sends a message and the re- ceiver attempts to infer its meaning in- tended by the sender. Basic issues in- volved in the game of natural language communication are discussed, such as salience, grammaticality, common sense, and common belief, together with some demonstration of the feasibility of game~ theoretic account of language. 1 Introduction Communication is a game (interaction among au- tonomous agents) by definition. So it can be ana- lyzed in game-theoretic terms} In this paper we study a fundamental aspect of linguistic commu- nication from the point of view of game theory, and enumerate some basic issues involved in the communication games of natural language. Let I be the proposition that the sender S in- tends to communicate a semantic content c to the receiver R. Then I entails that S intends that R should both recognize c and believe I. This is the core of nonnatural meaning (Grice, 1957; Grice, 1969). Grice's original notion of nonnatu- ral meaning further entails (S's intention of) R's believing (when e is a proposition or a reference) or obeying (when it is an order or a request) c, but we disregard this aspect and concentrate on this core. This restricted sense of nonnatural meaning im- plies that communication is inherently collabora- tive, because both S and R want that R should recognize c and I. S of course wants it, and so does R because it is beneficial in general to know what S intends to make R believe or obey. S might be lying or trying to mislead R, but even in 1See Osborne and R.ubinstein (1994), ~mong oth- ers, for general reference on game theory. such a case S is still intending to communicate a content c by way of making R recognize this inten- tion. Even if R doubts S's honesty, R will try to know what c is, because knowing what e is would help R infer what the hidden intent of S may be, among others. For instance, when S tells R that it is raining, R will learn that S wants to make R believe that it is raining. R would do so even if R knew that it is not raining. Even if R were unsin- cere and misunderstood S's message on purpose, 2 the nonnatural meaning is still properly conveyed, because otherwise the intended misunderstanding would be impossible. The present study concerns this aspect of com- munication, the nonnatural meaning in the re- stricted sense, which is a core of intended commu- nication. Lies, ironies, indirect speech acts, and so forth (Perrault, 1990; Perrault and Allen, 1980) all share this core. Our understanding about it will hence help us understand basic workings of natural communication systems. As an example, centering …

Content truncated to 500 words