Active Inference Institute (AII) is on the path of open-endedness. Our strategy considers learning and applying Active Inference for changes in the niche over multiple nested scales. Through time we increase the degree of hierarchical organizational complexity to overcome competing interactions and frustrated states.
We engage in policy selection, reducing our uncertainty about realizing our expectations and preferences for epistemic values as a non-profit organization. At the same time to ensure Institute development, we need to secure pragmatic financial sustainability with enabling activities.
The three scales that Active Inference Institute modifies and interact with:
Participant as an agent. Institute provides affordances and updates participants’ generative model via niche modification.
Institute as the agent. This is where we engage in Institute-level policies selection and evolve the shared generative model.
Ecosystem as epistemic niche. Institute active states modify niche & affordances.
1. Education
Participant scale. We approach participant’s Active Inference mastery as a system of interest. To reflect a plurality of individual priors, expertise levels, and preferences, we develop different educational formats, such as workshops, discussion groups, online courses, project-based learning, internship, etc. Our preference is to have up to a thousand participants involved in education by the end of 2024.
Institute scale. Institute learns state-of-the-art ways of working and practices across functional domains to build and strengthen organizational capabilities.
Ecosystem scale. Institute works on education and reducing research debt for a broad community. We develop public video and audio content to spread and prefer to reach out to dozens of thousands of people with it.
2. Research
Participant scale. We provide affordances to scaffold and launch research and development projects by participants. Projects can be driven by participants inside or outside our organization, the Institute will provide relevant support. We expect to see dozens of research outcomes, such as papers, workshop and conference presentations, etc.
Institute scale. As organization we arrange, catalyze, and participate in Active Inference research projects with long-term impact or public goods features such as ontology development, knowledge engineering, etc.; and events like symposiums and conferences.
Ecosystem scale. We recognize and seek to carry out, apply, and improve upon research practices from open science.
3. Outreach & Engagement
Participant scale. We think of participants as ambassadors of the Institute, so we welcome and support their initiatives to share a voice about Active Inference in various situations and communities.
Institute scale. We aim to set up partnerships with other organizations from academia, industry, and beyond. This supports high-quality science communication, education, and collaborations around research topics such as Active Inference.
Ecosystem scale. We acknowledge the diversity of peoples initial conditions, e.g. familiarity with language, science, philosophy, computation, etc. We develop project of Active Inference online journal and create popular science content for different social media.
4. Methods
Participant scale. We educate participants so that they grow their expertise level in different disciplines. As disciplinary expertise entails competency in practices and tools, we take a holistic approach to participant professional development.
Institute scale. Continuous organizational evolution is our fundamental effort. The Institute attempts to obtain and use the most advanced expertise in all practices. We apply Active Inference, Systems Thinking, and other first principle approaches to the Institute operations.
Ecosystem scale. We share and promote methods we use through the community to increase the quality and efficiency of collaborations, and also open to recommendations for new methods & strategies to consider.