Andrius Kulikauskas is applying to be an Active Inference Institute Research Fellow.
Active Inference Institute Research Fellow
1. Confirmation that one has read & agreed to the Research Fellows Terms.
2. Research proposal (1-6 pages, excluding citations), which can describe one or more research projects in detail or outline a research direction in more general terms. The proposal should include:
Title
Abstract (300 words or less)
Research question(s) and objectives
How to organize a science of subjective human experience?
- How to validate the methodology for such a science?
- How to foster collaboration on investigations and share endeavors, knowledge bases, and a conceptual language?
- How to connect with researches in a wide variety of theoretical frameworks?
What can Active Inference and the Free Energy Principle contribute to such a science?
- Can their functioning in subjective human experience be recognized internally, structurally, in terms of introspected contrasts (such as perception vs. action), rather than externally, numerically, in terms of objective measurements?
- Can their ontology serve as an interlingua across disparate theoretical frameworks?
- Can they help untangle different levels of awareness?
Is it helpful to distinguish three minds (levels of awareness)?
- An answering mind that unconsciously knows answers?
- A questioning mind that does not know, thus consciously asks questions?
- An investigating mind that balances the answering mind and the questioning mind, and then decides which one to implement?
Specifically, does it make sense to distinguish enactive Passive Inference filtering the past, predictive Active Inference projecting the future, and cybernetic Willful Inference steering the present by balancing Passive and Active and then selecting which to implement?
Can we distinguish and untangle the dynamics of these three minds?
- Argumentation: How do issues come to matter? Passively optimizing actions to reduce the natural tension in the environment.
- Verbalization: How does meaning arise? Actively creating artifical tension with concepts that guide us to stay, play and learn within safe alternatives.
- Narration: How do events happen? Willfully, conditionally, temporarily identifying with a character who experiences a shift in the gravity of the tension they are dealing with, as perceived across a baseline rhythm which alternates the creation and relaxation of tension.
Can we understand how these dynamics fit together to account for human experience? Can we apply and extend Active Inference to model this interplay in specific interesting cases?
Can we develop a model that helps us understand and empathize with human beings in general, particular human beings, and all manner of beings, appreciating their range of possibilities, and learning how to interact with them fully?
- Specifically, as a simplest form of this challenge, can we understand and empathize with an arbitrary triangle, appreciating the range of its possibilities, and learning how to interact with it fully?
a study of triangle geometry, a systematization of its ways of figuring things out, an analysis of the Encyclopedia of Triangle Centers, in terms of fundamental actions, the points they construct, and the different ways of constructing the same points, yield a language for interacting with an arbitrary triangle by which we can understand the entirety of what it avails us to imagine?
Having an example of such a language, can we show that the same language is at work in other domains, such as chess, music, humor, poetry, natural language... ?
What would this tell us about human experience, in general?
Understand and gain hands on experience with Active Inference in model-based analysis in terms of the key ideas, mathematical equations, and computations with ActiveInference.jl
Study the classic papers that represent the historical development of Active Inference and understand its relationships with other theoretical frameworks. Collect and systematize the ways that Karl Friston and/or Active Inference researchers figure things out.
Lead a weekly group of investigators of Subjective Human Experience, including introspection, contemplation, meditation, prayer, emotions, moods, fisualization, decision-making, morality and investigation, as part of the Active Inference ecosystem.
Establish knowledge bases, in the Public Domain, preferably collaboratively, which collect:
- Examples of the three minds but also other conceptual frameworks, as at Theory Translator.
- One's deepest value in life, relationship with truth, and investigatory questions, much as here and here, which individuals agree to share.
- Ways of figuring things out, for various disciplines and personalities, and their systematizations.
Significance and impact of the proposed research
Approach and research methods
Alignment with the Active Inference Institute’s mission
Improving the accessibility, rigor, and applicability of the Active Inference framework.
Accessibility
- Tutorial for ActiveInference.jl The ABCs of Active Inference.
- Express the fundamentals of model-based analysis with Active Inference in terms of exposition, mathematics, Julia routines, sample code, examples.
- Project Archive
- ActiveInference.jl project archive
- Theory Translator
- The Theory Translator aligns Active Inference with a multitude of frameworks and thinkers, ancient and modern.
- Active Inference can serve as a lingua franca.
Rigor
- Tutorial for ActiveInference.jl The ABCs of Active Inference.
- Express the fundamentals of model-based analysis with Active Inference in terms of exposition, mathematics, Julia routines, sample code, examples.
- Metaphysical analysis
- Distillation by clarification of metaphysical assumptions
- Clarification of ontology
Applicability
- Help to clarify where Active Inference applies and where it does not
- by proposing, considering, clarifying, confirming or rejecting a distinction between enactive Passive Inference, predictive Active Inference and cybernetic Willful Inference.
- Set within the dynamics of three languages
- Interplay of three languages
Anticipated measurements (outcomes and deliverables)
Timeline and milestones
People and institutions involved
Any dependencies or contingencies that might affect progress
Cited references (not counted in page limit)
In the research proposal, please clearly address:
- Motivation for proposed work and for applying for a fellowship
- Describe previous engagements/interactions with the Institute
- Describe Institute programs or activities of particular interest and/or that you intend to participate in or facilitate.
3. Curriculum vitae
4. One to Three letters of recommendation (submitted in application packet, or sent separately to blanket@activeinference.institute)
5. Up to five representative publications or products
Application questions and completed packets should be sent to blanket@activeinference.institute with [RESEARCH FELLOWS] in the Subject line. Please include all application components as separate PDF or document files attached to your email.