Agents Are Not Enough
2024/12/19 by Chirag Shah, Ryen W. White, Shah, Chirag +1 · 11 voices · 5 citations
Computer Science · Psychology · #AI in Service Interactions #Artificial Intelligence in Games #Economics #Social Robot Interaction and HRI #cs.AI #cs.HC #cs.MA
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2412.16241
published in arXiv (Cornell University) (Cornell University)
openalex publication_date 2024/12/19 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Abstract
In the midst of the growing integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) into various aspects of our lives, agents are experiencing a resurgence. These autonomous programs that act on behalf of humans are neither new nor exclusive to the mainstream AI movement. By exploring past incarnations of agents, we can understand what has been done previously, what worked, and more importantly, what did not pan out and why. This understanding lets us to examine what distinguishes the current focus on agents. While generative AI is appealing, this technology alone is insufficient to make new generations of agents more successful. To make the current wave of agents effective and sustainable, we envision an ecosystem that includes not only agents but also Sims, which represent user preferences and behaviors, as well as Assistants, which directly interact with the user and coordinate the execution of user tasks with the help of the agents.
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Discussions
- Agents Are Not Enough [hn, 207 points, 156 comments]
- Interesting ideas on designing agentic systems: Agents Are Not Enough (www.arxiv.org/pdf/2412.16241) [bsky, 4 points, 0 comments]
- I have been thinking about this lately, representing preferences and more layers beyond agents. Shah and White discuss that AI agents require 'Sims'—representations of user preferences—and 'Assistants [bsky, 3 points, 0 comments]
- Good paper with advice for those new to AI, don't repeat the same mistakes: "Agents are experiencing a resurgence ... By exploring past incarnations of agents, we can understand what has been done pre [bsky, 1 points, 0 comments]
- Agents Are Not Enough https://www.arxiv.org/pdf/2412.16241 [comments] [131 points] [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- speaking of career, i'm trying to learn a new field as fast as i can and everyone is selling but i'm not sure what to buy pictured: "Agents are not enough" www.arxiv.org/pdf/2412.16241 "More agent [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Agents Are Not Enough (arxiv.org) Main Link | Discussion [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Agents are not enough: www.arxiv.org/pdf/2412.16241 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Interested in AI agents? arxiv.org/abs/2412.16241 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Agents Are Not Enough #HackerNews arxiv.org/pdf/... [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Agents Are Not Enough https://www.arxiv.org/pdf/2412.16241 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42611099 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
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