Consciousness As An Inferential Model

In this podcast, I discuss the nature of consciousness as presented by Karl Friston in his article in Aeon magazine, entitled "The Mathmatics of Mind-Time." Friston is interested in the transition from blind mechanistic causation--i.e. B simply happens to occur as a result of A--to teleological causation in which B follows A as the consciously sought goal of an agent. Friston likens consciousness, in a reductionist manner, to any complex system like evolution, the weather, or even a virus. Complex systems share in common a tendency to maximize evidence about their surroundings in a way that minimizes surprise. We can develop an account of purpose in terms of evidence-seeking to minimize surprise that is opposed to entropic tendencies to dissipate energy in random sequences. The link to the article is here: https://aeon.co/essays/consciousness-is-not-a-thing-but-a-process-of-inference?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=a5ff1f090d-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_08_25_12_20&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-a5ff1f090d-70783053.