让神经网络像人一样逐步收集证据做决策,还能知道什么时候该停止。
Neural Bayesian Sequential Routing

- 用贝叶斯框架在图结构中动态积累证据,实现可解释的推理路径。
- 支持提前退出、异常检测和资源可控的计算,精度与传统模型相当。
- 适合需要透明决策过程的医疗诊断、高风险控制等场景。
人类决策是分步进行且关注不确定性的,但标准神经网络通常采用静态密集前向计算,难以观察证据获取、不确定性演变或何时停止计算。本文提出神经贝叶斯序贯路由(NBSR)框架,将神经推理建模为在分层有向无环图(DAG)上的主动证据累积过程。在狄利克雷-分类共轭框架下,神经专家查询持续的全局知识奥丁,提取正向证据向量作为伪计数,通过精确共轭加法更新狄利克雷信念状态。结合Gumbel-Softmax直通估计器,该更新实现硬路径依赖路由,同时保留代理梯度用于端到端训练。结果得到的狄利克雷精度与熵提供了不确定性量化、基于熵的提前退出、分布外(OOD)拒答及成本感知的证据获取机制。我们证明,在严格正向证据提取条件下,任意有效轨迹上总狄利克雷精度单调递增,边际预测方差有界,形式化了序贯‘假设精炼’;在理想容量与优化假设下,终端狄利克雷期望恢复贝叶斯最优条件分布。在视觉分类、结构化医疗诊断、语言建模、部分可观测控制及成本感知贝叶斯实验设计等多个任务上的实证评估表明,NBSR在保持竞争性预测性能的同时,提供透明的路由轨迹、路径依赖的证据归因、不确定性感知的决策控制和资源理性推理。整体而言,NBSR为可解释、模块化、资源理性的智能体人工智能提供了数学基础框架。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Human decision-making is sequential and uncertainty-aware, yet standard neural networks often rely on static, dense forward computation with limited visibility into evidence acquisition, uncertainty evolution, or when computation should stop. We introduce \textbf{Neural Bayesian Sequential Routing (NBSR)}, a framework that models neural inference as active evidence accumulation over a hierarchical Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG). Within a Dirichlet--Categorical conjugate framework, neural experts query a persistent global knowledge oracle to extract positive evidence vectors, which act as pseudo-counts and update a Dirichlet belief state by exact conjugate addition. Coupled with a Gumbel-Softmax Straight-Through estimator, this update enables hard, path-dependent routing while preserving surrogate gradients for end-to-end training. The resulting Dirichlet precision and entropy provide mechanisms for uncertainty quantification, entropy-based early exiting, OOD abstention, and cost-aware evidence acquisition. We prove that, under strictly positive evidence extraction, total Dirichlet precision increases monotonically along any valid trajectory and marginal predictive variance is bounded, formalizing sequential ``hypothesis sharpening''; under idealized capacity and optimization assumptions, the terminal Dirichlet expectation recovers the Bayes-optimal conditional distribution. Empirical evaluations across visual categorization, structured medical diagnosis, language modeling, partially observable control, and cost-aware Bayesian experimental design show that NBSR achieves competitive predictive performance while providing transparent routing traces, path-dependent evidence attribution, uncertainty-aware decision control, and resource-rational inference. Overall, NBSR offers a mathematically grounded framework for interpretable, modular, and resource-rational agentic AI.
Thank you to arXiv for use of its open access interoperability. PaperDance 不是 arXiv 官方产品;中文卡片由大模型生成,请以原文为准。