Strong continuity of life and mind: the free energy framework, predictive processing and ecological psychology
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Date
31/07/2021Author
Sims, Matthew
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Abstract
Located at the intersection of philosophy of cognitive science and philosophy of
biology, this thesis aims to provide a novel approach to understanding the strong
continuity between life and mind. This thesis applies the Free Energy Framework,
predictive processing and the conceptual apparatus from ecological psychology to
reveal different manners in which the organizational processes and principles
underlying life have been enriched so as to result in cognitive processes. By using
these anticipatory cognitive frameworks this thesis unveils different forms of
cognition at work in surprising places and considers how such expressions of
cognition are ultimately driven by various forms of environmental complexity.
Importing the concepts of affordances, environmental information and perceptual
medium from ecological psychology into predictive processing and the Free
Energy Framework, an empirically grounded account of cognition as an
anticipatory process that allows living systems to adapt to various degrees of
uncertainty in their environments at distinct and yet overlapping timescales is
argued for. In doing so, this thesis attempts to identify both the explanatory limits
of ecological coupling accounts of perception and action, and the possible
environmental conditions under which the predictive brain evolved from its
decentralized non-neural predecessors as a solution to uncertainty. In contributing
to a novel approach to constraining the mind, the various concepts deployed in
both philosophy and cognitive science are sharpened, furthering the current
debate on what cognition is and how it is related to life.