George Deane
My PhD focused on understanding the nature of consciousness and the self within the embodied predictive processing and active inference framework. More specifically, I argued that consciousness and phenomenal selfhood (broadly, the sense of being a self) can be understood in terms of an “allostatic control model”. I make the case that phenomenal selfhood arises from a hierarchically deep inference about control of bodily states. Consciousness then emerges as fundamentally embodied and affective on this view, functioning to ‘tune’ organisms to opportunities for adaptive action in the environment. Recently, I have applied this research to developing new conceptions of the relationship between consciousness and self-consciousness - see my papers, Dissolving the Self: Active Inference, Psychedelics, and Ego-Dissolution (link), and Losing Ourselves: Active Inference, Depersonalisation and Meditation (link).
Today, I am exploring the implications of the active inference framework for understanding and designing next generation intelligent machines. In particular, my research focuses on how active inference can inform the development and implementation of machine analogues for human emotion, metacognition, attention and mental action (e.g. metareasoning, mental time travel, imagination).
Today, I am exploring the implications of the active inference framework for understanding and designing next generation intelligent machines. In particular, my research focuses on how active inference can inform the development and implementation of machine analogues for human emotion, metacognition, attention and mental action (e.g. metareasoning, mental time travel, imagination).