September 2024 Newsletter 🎑🏔🎃 Active Inference Institute

Watch these updates in video form in the 3rd Quarterly Roundtable.

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Institute updates

• The 4th annual Applied Active Inference Symposium will be November 13-15, 2024 (primarily online, with some possible in-person activities globally). Karl Friston will be the keynote speaker & opening session of the Symposium. We have 10+ other presenters confirmed already, and are designing hackathons and other interactive sessions.
• Currently we are seeking presenters for presentations, workshops, panels, and other sessions that reflect updates and challenges related to applying Active Inference across domains. If interested, please check out the call for presenters and forward it along to anyone who might be a good fit.
• We are also seeking organizations who may be interested in partnership(e.g. collaborating on a session, focus track, or area of application) or sponsorship(supportive financial or in-kind donation in exchange for visibility and other benefits).
• The co-organizer team is excited to provide more updates on the Symposium, and participant registration information, in the weeks to come.
• Leading up to the November 13-15 Symposium, we will be collaborating on version 2 of our “Active Inference Institute/Ecosystem” paper (see version 1 from 2023). This document provides a key entry point into our field (learning and applying Active Inference) and our organization (laying out the history, structure, participatory affordances of the Institute). We welcome engagement and interaction here with those who have contributed to different aspects of our ecosystem over the years — your perspective is vital here in this integrative exercise.
• If you would like to join this collaborative team — complete this form by October 5. We will collaborate on this leading up to the Symposium (the 2024 snapshot will be published in days leading up to the Symposium).
• Overall, in this 3rd quarter we are looking forward to continuing the work around the currently active projects. There are many exciting ways that the project proposal/measurement system has been enabling participation in 2024 and raising visibility. Over the coming months we will work to distill the Epistemic and Pragmatic value from this year, and get things in place for 2025. Between the Symposium and Institute/Ecosystem paper (above), there are some exciting ways for people and organizations to learn and make a difference in this final months of the year.
• The rest of this newsletter is composed of our bundled updates from projects and people in the Active Inference ecosystem (complete a Measurement form if you have updates to report for future newsletters).

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EduActive unit updates

See here for all projects and more information on the education work at the EduActive organizational unit.

• The Textbook Group is active in Cohort 7 and Cohort 6, reading through the 2022 Active Inference Parr et al. textbook. This time around we are enjoying informal Math Group sessions with Octopus, working on the fundamental mathematics and context helpful for learning the material in the book. We are using RxInfer.jl for better understanding and applicability of the Textbook. Registration for the Textbook Group is is open here.
• Susan Hasty reports on A framework for a Pattern Library of Negotiation Movement Solutions for the Active Inference Institute Community. These training sessions are facilitated for free and open to the global public for one hour every Wednesday, Thursday & Friday. Sign up here to receive a weekly update and schedule for upcoming events or reach out to Susan Hasty on Discord or by email at contact address

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ReInference unit updates

See here for all research & development work at the ReInference organizational unit.

• In RxInfer.jl learning and application project, we applied for two grants:
• FarmWorks: Decentralized AI Agents for Personalized Solutions for a Future of Life Institute grant program.
• VILLAGE (Validating Inference for Large-scale Agent Governance Ecosystems) for a Foresight Institute grant program.
• We look forward to hearing back from these grants & continuing to find ways to support people’s dedicated time on Active Inference.

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Feedback & Engagement

Please send in a Measurement if you have any Active Inference-related updates to share. We may include those updates in a future newsletter.

See all ongoing activities and projects, and join the Institute Discord, to get involved with our community.

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AII Officers

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