High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! In economics, game theory, decision theory, and artificial intelligence, a rational agent is an agent which has clear preferences, models uncertainty via expected values, and always chooses to perform the action that results in the optimal outcome for itself from among all feasible actions. Rational agents are also studied in the fields of cognitive science, ethics, and philosophy, including the philosophy of practical reason. A rational agent can be anything that makes decisions, typically a person, firm, machine, or software. The action a rational agent takes depends on: the preferences of the agent the agent's information of its environment, which may come from past experiences the actions, duties and obligations available to the agent the estimated or actual benefits and the chances of success of the actions.