Beyond Bayesian Accuracy: Skill, Abduction, and the Free Energy Principle in Normative Rationality


Pietarinen A., DAVOODY BENI M.

FOUNDATIONS OF SCIENCE, 2025 (SCI-Expanded, AHCI, Scopus) identifier identifier

  • Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
  • Basım Tarihi: 2025
  • Doi Numarası: 10.1007/s10699-025-10013-4
  • Dergi Adı: FOUNDATIONS OF SCIENCE
  • Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED), Arts and Humanities Citation Index (AHCI), Scopus, Compendex, Philosopher's Index, zbMATH
  • Anahtar Kelimeler: Abduction, Accuracy, Free energy principle, Normative rationality, Pragmatism, Skill scores
  • Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet

Özet

This paper challenges traditional accuracy-centric accounts of rationality by synthesising the Free Energy Principle (FEP) with Charles Peirce's pragmatist epistemology. Whereas the FEP frames cognition as a biological imperative to minimise surprise through predictive models, we argue that its normative force emerges when integrated with Peircean abduction and skill-based metrics. By reinterpreting rationality through skill scores-Peirce's 1884 method for evaluating rare-event predictions-we demonstrate that survival-driven inference prioritises context-sensitive skill over abstract accuracy. The FEP's variational free-energy minimisation aligns with abduction's dynamic conjecture-making, revealing rationality as a pragmatic negotiation between organismic survival and environmental complexity. Critically, we show that Bayesian accuracy measures (e.g., Kullback-Leibler divergence) fail to capture the adequacy conditions for skillful forecasting, whereas Peirce's skill score satisfies constraints such as error weighting and directionality. This fusion of FEP and pragmatism advances a naturalistic-normative framework in which rationality is grounded in adaptive, enactive inference rather than idealised coherence, bridging computational neuroscience and theoretical biology with philosophical accounts of inquiry.