Inês Hipólito

Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin | HU Berlin · Berlin School of Mind and Brain

One of the criteria to a strong principle in natural sciences is simplicity. This paper claims that the Free Energy Principle (FEP), by virtue of unifying particles with mind, is the simplest. Motivated by Hilbert's 24th problem of simplicity, the argument is made that the FEP takes a seemingly mathematical complex domain and reduces it to somethin...

Modularity is arguably one of the most influential theses guiding research on brain and cognitive function since phrenology. This paper considers the following question: is modularity entailed by recent Bayesian models of brain and cognitive function, especially the predictive processing framework? It starts by considering three of the most well-ar...

When someone masters a skill, their performance looks to us like second nature: it looks as if their actions are smoothly performed without explicit, knowledge-driven, online monitoring of their performance. Contemporary computational models in motor control theory, however, are instructionist: that is, they cast skillful performance as a knowledge...

Recent characterisations of self-organising systems depend upon the presence of a Markov blanket: a statistical boundary that mediates the interactions between what is inside of and outside of a system. We leverage this idea to provide an analysis of partitions in neuronal systems. This is applicable to brain architectures at multiple scales, enabl...

The aim of this paper is twofold: (1) to assess whether the construct of neural representations plays an explanatory role under the variational free-energy principle and its corollary process theory, active inference; and (2) if so, to assess which philosophical stance - in relation to the ontological and epistemological status of representations -...

This paper defends that from macroscale human computation, it does not follow that microscale processes involve ontological properties of macroscale computation. Section 1 critically assesses and rejects computational realism, i.e. realism about computational models. Section 2 defends that beyond the mind-machine analogy, there is a more suited ana...

We propose a non-representationalist framework for deep learning relying on a novel method: computational phenomenology, a dialogue between the first-person perspective (relying on phenomenology) and the mechanisms of computational models. We thereby reject the modern cognitivist interpretation of deep learning, according to which artificial neural...

Enactive Artificial Intelligence (eAI) motivates new directions towards gender-inclusive AI. Beyond a mirror reflecting our values, AI design has a profound impact on shaping the enaction of cultural identities. The traditionally unrepresentative, white, cisgender, heterosexual dominant narratives are partial, and thereby active vehicles of social...

Substance addiction has been historically conceived and widely researched as a brain disease. There have been ample criticisms of brain-centred approaches to addiction, and this paper aims to align with one such criticism by applying insights from phenomenology of psychiatry. More precisely, this work will apply Merleau-Ponty’s insightful distincti...

In their impressive paper, Bruineberg et al. (2021) make a significant contribution to the Free Energy Principle literature by distinguishing between 'Pearl blankets' and 'Friston blankets', identifying the former as an epistemic tool, and the latter in terms of its novel metaphysical use. We note the oft-forgotten theoretical context of these stat...

In their important contribution to the free energy principle (FEP) literature, Raja et al. (2021) point out crucial shortcomings and issues for the FEP to meet its ambitious goals, including the provision of a unified science with specific focus on cognitive and biological sciences. and the FEP ambition to establish an operationally defined, object...

There is growing evidence for the safety and efficacy of psychedelic therapy in mental health care. What is less understood however, is how psychedelics act to yield therapeutic results. In this paper we propose that psychedelics act as destabilisers — both in a psychological and a neurophysiological sense. Our proposed framework builds on the ‘ent...

This chapter takes inspiration from Wittgenstein’s thinking to formulate a non-reductive toolbox associated with generative modelling, specifically as applied in complex adaptive systems theory. It converges on a communal perspective on religion as multiscale active inference that contrasts starkly with common “straw person” perspectives on religio...

Addiction has been historically conceived and widely researched as a brain disease. While there has been much criticism of brain-centred approaches to addiction, this paper aims to reject such an approach by applying insights from phenomenology of psychiatry. More precisely, the paper applies Merleau-Ponty’s insightful distinction between the biolo...

In this commentary on the paper of Aguilera et al. titled "How particular is the physics of the free-energy principle", we argue that the applicability of the FEP should exhibit certain particularities in order to be informative for exciting frontiers of investigation such as (the emergence of) biological life. In our view, axiomatic formulations o...

In this theoretical review, we begin by discussing brains and minds from a dynamical systems perspective, and then go on to describe methods for characterizing the flexibility of dynamic networks. We discuss how varying degrees and kinds of flexibility may be adaptive (or maladaptive) in different contexts, specifically focusing on measures related...

This paper proposes an account of neurocognitive activity without leveraging the notion of neural representation. Neural representation is a concept that results from assuming that the properties of the models used in computational cognitive neuroscience (e.g., information, representation, etc.) must literally exist the system being modelled (e.g.,...

A number of perceptual (exteroceptive and proprioceptive) illusions present problems for predictive processing accounts. In this chapter we’ll review explanations of the Müller-Lyer Illusion (MLI), the Rubber Hand Illusion (RHI) and the Alien Hand Illusion (AHI) based on the idea of Prediction Error Minimization (PEM), and show why they fail. In sp...

Radically enactive accounts of perceiving directly and diametrically oppose their representationalist rivals. This is true even of the most radical predictive processing theories of perception which embrace some enactivist assumptions yet retain some commitment to representationalism. Which framework should we prefer? This chapter seeks to make hea...

The aim of this paper is twofold: it critically analyses and rejects accounts blending active inference as theory of mind and enactivism; and it advances an enactivist-dynamic account of social cognition that is compatible with active inference. While some inference models of social cognition seemingly take an enactive perspective on social cogniti...

Abstract deadline: June 1, 2021. Paper deadline: October 1, 2021. Please see: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/20474/bio-ai---from-embodied-cognition-to-enactive-robotics

We are living through a new phase in human development where much of everyday life – at least in the most technologically developed parts of the world – has come to depend upon our interaction with “smart” artefacts. Alongside this increasing adoption and ever-deepening reliance on intelligent machines, important changes have been taking place, oft...

In this theoretical review, we begin by discussing brains and minds from a dynamical systems perspective, and then go on to describe methods for characterizing the flexibility of dynamic networks. We discuss how varying degrees and kinds of flexibility may be adaptive (or maladaptive) in different contexts, specifically focusing on measures related...

Recent characterisations of self-organising systems depend upon the presence of a ‘Markov blanket’: a statistical boundary that mediates the interactions between the inside and outside of a system. We leverage this idea to provide an analysis of partitions in neuronal systems. This is applicable to brain architectures at multiple scales, enabling p...

This edited book deepens the engagement between 21st century philosophy of mind and the emerging technologies which are transforming our environment. Many new technologies appear to have important implications for the human mind, the nature of our cognition, our sense of identity and even perhaps what we think human beings are. They prompt question...

The free energy principle provides an increasingly popular framework to biology and cognitive science. However, it remains disputed whether its statistical models are scientific tools to describe non-equilibrium steady-state systems (which we call the instrumentalist reading), or are literally implemented and utilized by those systems (the realist...

At the inception of human brain mapping, two principles of functional anatomy underwrote most conceptions – and analyses – of distributed brain responses: namely functional segregation and integration. There are currently two main approaches to characterising functional integration. The first is a mechanistic modelling of connectomics in terms of d...

The aim of this paper is twofold: (1) to assess whether the construct of neural representations plays an explanatory role under the variational free-energy principle and its corollary process theory, active inference; and (2) if so, to assess which philosophical stance—in relation to the ontological and epistemological status of representations—is...

Wright and Bourke's compelling article rightly points out that existing models of embryogenesis fail to explain the mechanisms and functional significance of the dynamic connections among neurons. We pursue their account of Dynamic Logic by appealing to the Markov blanket formalism that underwrites the Free Energy Principle. We submit that this all...

Wright and Bourkes compelling article rightly points out that existing models of embryogenesis fail to explain the mechanisms and functional significance of the dynamic connections among neurons. We pursue their account of Dynamic Logic by appealing to the Markov blanket formalism that underwrites the Free Energy Principle. We submit that this allo...

At the inception of human brain mapping, two principles of functional anatomy underwrote most conceptions - and analyses - of distributed brain responses: namely functional segregation and integration. There are currently two main approaches to characterising functional integration. The first is a mechanistic modelling of connectomics in terms of d...

Modularity is arguably one of the most influential theses guiding research on brain and cognitive function since phrenology. This paper considers the following question: is modularity entailed by recent Bayesian models of brain and cognitive function, especially the predictive processing framework? It starts by considering three of the most well-ar...

This paper argues that it is possible to embrace the predictive processing framework (PP) without reducing affordances to inferential perception. The cognitivist account of PP contends that it can capture relational perception, such as affordances. The rationale for this claim is that over time, sensory data becomes highly-weighted. This paper, how...

Reports of patients with schizophrenia show a fragmented and anomalous subjective experience. This pathological subjective experience, we suggest, can be related to the fact that disembodiment inhibits the possibility of intersubjective experience, and more importantly of common sense. In this paper, we ask how to investigate the anomalous experien...

Schizophrenia is usually described as a fragmentation of subjective experience and the impossibility to engage in meaningful cultural and intersubjective practices. Although the term schizophrenia is less than 100 years old, madness is generally believed to have accompanied mankind through its historical and cultural ontogeny. What does it mean to...

There are two fundamental models to understanding the phenomenon of natural life. One is the computational model, which is based on the symbolic thinking paradigm. The other is the biological organism model. The common difficulty attributed to these paradigms is that their reductive tools allow the phenomenological aspects of experience to remain h...

Neuronal functional protein networks found in the oral proteome are possibly useful to characterize a healthy phenome state and trait. Proteomics have extensively and objectively epitomized the understanding of healthy and pathological physiological states or conditions. Our group aims at the molecular characterization of cognition.

Several studies suggest that the disorders of the self include a disturbance of the most elementary component of self - the minimal self. Characterizing these disorders and understanding the mechanisms involved remain a challenge to medical epistemology and health care professionals. In the present work, I bring together concepts of different field...

Oxytocin secreted from the pituitary gland cannot re-enter the brain because of the blood-brain barrier. Instead, the behavioral effects of oxytocin are thought to reflect release from centrally projecting oxytocin neurons, different from those that project to the pituitary gland. Oxytocin receptors are expressed by neurons in many parts of the bra...

The importance of mathematical proof is hardly underestimated; it is the doorway to finding new and non-ordinary ways to look at the systems and to explain phenomena. We certainly know that mathematics allow us to solve an equation, to find a function or to proof a theorem. However, knowing how to differentiate a function is certainly not the same...

In our day-to-day lives we are constantly exposed to the actions of other individuals who inhabit the social world. We not only experience their behavior, understand its contents and anticipate their consequences, but also we can do much more than that: we can attribute intentions to others and recognize immediately if their behavior is the result...

Kurt Gödel wrote (1964, p. 272), after he had read Husserl, that the notion of objectivity raises a question: "the question of the objective existence of the objects of mathematical intuition (which, incidentally, is an exact replica of the question of the objective existence of the outer world)". This "exact replica" brings to mind the close analo...

With neurons emergence, life alters itself in a remarkable way. This embodied neurons become carriers of signals, and processing devices: it begins an inexorable progression of functional complexity, from increasingly drawn behaviors to the mind and eventually to consciousness (Damásio, 2010). In which moment has awareness arisen in the history of...

Gödel’s incompleteness theorems are categorically among the most important discoveries ever made not only to Mathematics and logics, but also to Philosophy. Gödel’s incompleteness theorems can be applied to demonstrate that the human mind overtakes any mechanism or formal system. Anti-mechanism theses from the incompleteness theorems were presented...

Gödel’s incompleteness theorems are categorically among the most important discoveries ever made not only to Mathematics and logics, but also to Philosophy. Gödel’s incompleteness theorems can be applied to demonstrate that the human mind overtakes any mechanism or formal system. Anti-mechanism theses from the incompleteness theorems were presented...

Persons with Autistic Spectrum Disorder show various difficulties in social skills, cognitive processing and other co-occurring behavioral and physical problems. Taking into account that people with autism demonstrate a lack of ability in dealing with others, the study of autism, with its specific constellation of behavioral and cognitive deficienc...

We perceive the environment and ourselves through the sensory system (Gallagher , 2005; Gallese and Sinigaglia , 2011; Damasio , 2012). The multisensory integration with the environment relates to the various aspects of self-experience, body recognition, actions, imagination, memory and consciousness (Gallagher , 2000; Damasio, 2001). We Share with...