Predictive processing, rational constructivism, and Bayesian models of development: Commentary

This is a commentary and thus does not have an abstract, but here are the summary paragraphs which give similar information: "I feel like all I’ve done is ask a bunch of questions, which makes writing a summary difficult. I actually am a fan of all of the theoretical frameworks under discussion, and I think this special issue brought together a great set of papers. I have nitpicks and disagreements with (parts of) many of them, but that is absolutely normal, and they all contribute to our understanding of cognitive development. I didn’t write about their greatness, though, because that is a bit boring. .... Rather – to get meta for a moment – I thought these questions were the best way to maximise the value of my commentary: they have the highest probability of leading to the most uncertainty reduction for our field in the long term. They also have the highest probability of making me look silly. In writing this, I pushed the boundaries of my own knowledge; it’s up to you to decide whether this is at the “sweet spot” of maximum information gain or utterly useless or somewhere in the middle. So I will conclude by begging your forbearance. Please take this commentary in the spirit it was written: as scientific play, throwing some stuff out there in the hopes that it leads somewhere for someone. If not, oh well! Don’t judge the papers based on the high-entropy nature of anything I said here, and thanks for bearing with me.