#01Nov 5, 2026
cs.LG
The Blindfolded Controller: Decision Model-Guided Training for Reinforcement Learning
Muhammad Ibrahim Khan, Aniket Dixit, Faizan Ahmed and 1 more
Reinforcement learning (RL) provides a framework for continuous improvement through interaction with an environment. However, RL agents struggle against tasks that offer exploration challenges and sparse rewards, because learning efficient policies from scratch is slow and sample-inefficient. In contrast, decision models (DMs), given a description of the environment and task, can perform well in sparse-reward tasks, but, as they do not learn from reward, they are not able to improve towards the optimal solution. In this paper, we present Decision Model-Guided Training (DMGT), a technique that uses a DM with a description of the environment and task to initialise an RL policy, combining the DM's ability to act without training with RL's ability to improve from reward. Instead of exploring from scratch, the agent reaches the goal and receives reward from its first episodes, and RL then improves its policy beyond what the DM achieves. We demonstrate through experiments on seven tasks that our approach outperforms RL in all seven and DM in five. In addition, we provide comprehensive guidelines, derived from ablation studies, for describing an environment and task to a DM.
#02Nov 5, 2026
cs.LG
DISCERN: Distributional Synthetic Replay for Retain-Free Incremental Machine Unlearning
Nicolás Segura-Kunsagi, Juan Luis Suárez-Díaz, Iván Sevillano-García and 1 more
Machine unlearning aims to remove the influence of specific training data from a trained model without retraining from scratch. In real deployments, however, deletion requests arrive over time, calling for incremental class unlearning (ICU): classes are removed sequentially, previously forgotten knowledge must remain forgotten, and the remaining classes must be preserved. We present DIstributional SynthetiC rEplay for Retain-free iNcremental unlearning (DISCERN), an intervention-based class unlearning method that replaces access to the retain set with synthetic embeddings sampled from per-class parametric distributions. Unlike prototype-based replay, which assumes an isotropic Gaussian around each class centroid, DISCERN fits Euclidean (Gaussian, Laplace, Student's $t$) and directional (von Mises--Fisher, Fisher--Bingham) families to each class and selects among them through statistical tests and, when none of them accepts, cross-validated log-likelihood. This design is motivated by the architecture-dependent latent geometry: transformer embeddings lie approximately on a hypersphere and concentrate around class directions, unlike those of convolutional networks. We evaluate DISCERN against seven retain-free baselines on MNIST, CIFAR-10, and CIFAR-100 with two convolutional and two transformer backbones, under single-class, multi-class, and incremental unlearning. DISCERN is competitive when classes are removed at once and is the most stable method in ICU on transformers: on ViT-B/16, after 20 sequential deletions it retains a harmonic mean of $0.797$, whereas the strongest method in the simultaneous setting drops from $0.918$ to $0.048$. A paired ablation shows that per-class distribution selection substantially reduces the resurfacing of previously forgotten classes, acting as a stabilizer of accumulated forgetting rather than a uniform improvement.
#03Nov 5, 2026
cs.LG
Same Answer, Different Future: Matched Predictions Do Not Imply Matched Belief Updating in Language Models
Weihan Li, Junhao Wu, Xinlei Chen and 1 more
Language models can produce similar probabilistic predictions after observing outcomes, reading summaries, receiving instructions, or undergoing activation interventions. Whether these routes induce equivalent belief states remains unclear: agreement in current predictions does not establish how a model will respond to subsequent evidence. We investigate this distinction in a Bernoulli inference task with an analytic Bayesian reference. Across three open-weight language models, we prepare states through four textual routes and two activation-level interventions, measure both next-outcome continuations and explicit probabilistic estimates, and append identical new evidence from each prepared state. We quantify the persistence of the initial belief through its effective evidence weight, the number of new observations it is worth. We find that the format of evidence decides which readouts express its content: outcome sequences primarily affect continuations, whereas summaries and stated rates primarily affect explicit estimates. Moreover, effective weights differ substantially across routes, with summaries receiving weights that scale weakly with their stated observation counts and elicitation questions changing inferred weights by orders of magnitude. In a one-shot steering setting, an intervention that reproduces a natural record's immediate prediction loses most of its effect under subsequent evidence. These results show that agreement in current readouts is insufficient to establish equivalence in belief updating: how a belief is acquired and how it is read jointly determine its subsequent dynamics.
#04Nov 5, 2026
cs.CY
tok: a textual concrete syntax of BPMN and DMN for humans and AI agents
Marek Deja
tok is a plain-text notation for Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) 2.0.2 process models and Decision Model and Notation (DMN) 1.5 decisions. One engine checks a tok document against both standards, compiles the document to XML with an automatic diagram, and serves language-model applications through the Model Context Protocol. The paper classifies the notation as an alternative concrete syntax of the BPMN and DMN metamodels and reports one study. A tok model takes 2.2 times fewer tokens than the smallest BPMN XML of 893 files exported by 37 tools and 7.7 times fewer than the files as exported. The checker signals 98.2% of 1,411 injected faults, against 85.8% for the XML Schema with bpmnlint. Four language models new to tok write valid tok from a one-page reference for 85.7 to 100% of 87 process descriptions from two datasets and valid BPMN XML for every description, and the strongest model writes tok with 25% and 19% fewer tokens than BPMN XML. As agents with a lean skill and one checker tool, the models write valid tok for 97.6 to 100% of the descriptions, the strongest model spends 21% and 14% fewer tokens on tok than on BPMN XML, and a skill which sends the model to read the reference through a tool costs 1.7 to 2.8 times the tokens of the lean skill. Of 47 event logs simulated from public models, 44 fit their source models, and tok imports every model discovered from the logs.
#05Nov 5, 2026
cs.AI
Persistent Retrieval for Conversational Agents: A Study of Retrieval Efficiency
Karthik Ravula, Sathwik Kowtha, Rishabh Verma and 2 more
Conversational agents can retrieve information directly or delegate retrieval to a subagent. This design choice affects how retrieval history is maintained, what context each model call receives, and what information must be re-retrieved in follow-up questions. We compare three designs: skill-based retrieval in the main agent, a non-persistent retrieval subagent that generates a findings response, and our persistent retrieval subagent, which maintains retrieval history across turns and returns retrieved evidence directly to the main agent. Our approach also allows the main agent to request corrections from the same subagent. We evaluate the three designs on enterprise questions posed independently, within shared conversations, and as dependent follow-ups. Across five multi-turn settings, our approach uses 43.3% fewer recorded agent-model tokens and incurs 45.0% lower estimated API cost than skill-based retrieval, while reducing average response time by 9.1%. Compared with non-persistent retrieval, it reduces response time by 15.6 seconds per question, while using 65.1% more tokens and incurring 29.1% higher estimated API cost. Our approach shifts the retrieval subagent from producing synthesized responses to maintaining retrieval state and supplying evidence that the main agent can directly evaluate and use for answer generation.