What is Agent?
Agent — A system that perceives, decides, and acts toward a goal with some degree of autonomy.
The agent is the unit of the agentic web — software that does not just answer but acts. As agents proliferate, the surrounding primitives (identity, orchestration, observability, attribution) become the real infrastructure, and the names for them become the coordinates of the category.
Where agent sits in the stack
In the four-layer architecture of the agentic web, agent is a Cross-cutting concept — it applies across every layer of the stack. See the thesis for how the layers compound.
Agent in the portfolio
281 positions in the Semantic Substrate portfolio carry the Agent primitive — 112 available individually, 169 held as a coordinated set. Explore the Agent cluster →
Quick answers
- What is Agent in agentic systems?
- A system that perceives, decides, and acts toward a goal with some degree of autonomy.
- Where does Agent sit in the agentic stack?
- Agent sits at the Cross-cutting layer — it applies across every layer of the stack.
- How many Agent domain positions exist in the Semantic Substrate portfolio?
- 281 positions carry the Agent primitive — 112 available individually, the rest held as a coordinated set.
Related primitives
ConstitutionalInfrastructureObservabilityOrchestrationIntelligenceAttestationAttributionConvergenceIntegrationAutonomousCapabilityDelegationFederationGovernanceProvenanceSettlementAuthorityExecutionPrecedentSovereignSubstrateDecisionOverridePlatformProtocolSemanticTemporalBindingCustodyEconomyLineageProcessQuantumRoyaltySpatialUnifiedNeuralSafetyTreatyGhostModelSwarmTrustTwin
Held in the portfolio under Agent.