On Chatbots Exhibiting Goal-Directed Autonomy in Dynamic Environments
  Conversation interfaces (CIs), or chatbots, are a popular form of intelligent
agents that engage humans in task-oriented or informal conversation. In this
position paper and demonstration, we argue that chatbots working in dynamic
environments, like with sensor data, can not only serve as a promising platform
to research issues at the intersection of learning, reasoning, representation
and execution for goal-directed autonomy; but also handle non-trivial business
applications. We explore the underlying issues in the context of Water Advisor,
a preliminary multi-modal conversation system that can access and explain water
quality data.
