Representation Wars: Enacting an Armistice Through Active Inference

TLDR

For three decades, cognitive science has debated whether neurocognitive processes are representational, with recent advances and the emergence of active inference fueling both representationalist and dynamicist perspectives. The authors aim to show that a detailed analysis of active inference’s formal structure can reconcile representationalist and dynamicist positions. The study finds that representationalist and dynamicist sensibilities can peacefully coexist within active inference.

Abstract

Over the last 30 years, representationalist and dynamicist positions in the philosophy of cognitive science have argued over whether neurocognitive processes should be viewed as representational or not. Major scientific and technological developments over the years have furnished both parties with ever more sophisticated conceptual weaponry. In recent years, an enactive generalization of predictive processing – known as active inference – has been proposed as a unifying theory of brain functions. Since then, active inference has fueled both representationalist and dynamicist campaigns. However, we believe that when diving into the formal details of active inference, one should be able to find a solution to the war; if not a peace treaty, surely an armistice of a sort. Based on an analysis of these formal details, this paper shows how both representationalist and dynamicist sensibilities can peacefully coexist within the new territory of active inference.