Surfing Uncertainty by Andy Clark
Prediction, Action, and the Embodied Mind
The book argues that the brain functions as a hierarchical prediction engine that constantly generates and updates probabilistic models of the world, using incoming sensory input to minimize prediction error, so that perception becomes a form of hypothesis testing and action serves to confirm or disconfirm expectations (active inference). It emphasizes how precision-weighting of prediction errors governs attention and learning, and shows how this predictive-processing framework can illuminate perception, motor control, conscious experience, and psychopathology. The account locates cognition in embodied and environmentally embedded systems, arguing that body and world play constitutive roles in shaping inference and intelligent behavior, with broad implications for neuroscience, psychology, and artificial systems.
- Published
- 2015
- Nationality
- British
- Length
- Moderate
- Pages
- 424
- Original Language
- English
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- Alternate Titles
- None
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