This paper takes a fresh look at Sass & Parnas’ Ipseity Disturbance Hypothesis about Schizophrenia. It asks how well the current theorization in terms of hyperreflexivity, disturbed self-presence and diminished grip really explain the phenomenology of schizophrenia. It then turns to a detailed discussion of the way the various elements of ipseity disturbance are supposed to be explained finding there are certain gaps in that explanation. The second part discusses how the new Hierarchical Predictive Processing (HPP) framework can do a good job explaining and inter-relating the three factors in ipseity disturbance: first, distortions of presence; second, hyperreflexivity; and third, why some distortions of presence progress to the positive symptoms of schizophrenia, namely hallucination and especially delusions. The paper argues that really moving toward a deep understanding of schizophrenia requires grounding the theory in a mechanistic explanation. HPP is well-poised to play this role by explaining why distortions of presence might lead to hallucination and global changes in the structure of a patient’s beliefs.

In this opinion, I examine the benefits of the enactivist approach in the study of perception and hallucination, which have traditionally been studied in the context of analytic philosophy. I consider some arguments that rescue the role of objects and the body in the perceptual experience, which allow certain clarities regarding the case of hallucination.

Key words: perception, hallucination, enactivism, representationalism, disjunctivism

It has been argued that the worldwide prevalence of certain types of geometric visual patterns found in prehistoric art can be best explained by the common experience of these patterns as geometric hallucinations during altered states of consciousness induced by shamanic ritual practices. And in turn the worldwide prevalence of these types of hallucinations has been explained by appealing to humanity’s shared neurobiological embodiment. Moreover, it has been proposed that neural network activity can exhibit similar types of spatiotemporal patterns, especially those caused by Turing instabilities under disinhibited, non-ordinary conditions. Altered states of consciousness thus provide a suitable pivot point from which to investigate the complex relationships between symbolic material culture, first-person experience, and neurobiology. We critique prominent theories of these relationships. Drawing inspiration from neurophenomenology, we sketch the beginnings of an alternative, enactive approach centered on the concepts of sense-making, value, and sensorimotor decoupling.

Key words: enaction, sense-making, representation, hallucination, turing patterns, human cognition

Problem: This paper argues for the inclusion of a cybernetic-constructivist approach to the art of painting and for an understanding of principles that coincide with constructivism that operate within the creation of paintings and other works of art. It argues that an understanding of cybernetic-constructivist principles improves creative practice rather than merely analyzes outcomes. Method: Written from the point of view of a longtime practitioner rather than from the point of view of an academic proponent of art theory or art history, the paper draws on insights of second-order cyberneticians whose principles help to understand what a painting is and to determine its status as an object among objects which communicates itself simultaneously as not-an-object. These principles form an outlook as they become enfolded in sensibility, and through this outlook, the problem of being a painter can be addressed, the range of invention can be apprehended and broadened, and creativity can be mindfully activated. It addresses how painting and explained and how painting can co-create meaning with a viewer. Results: It is proposed that inquiry into painting may be of value in teaching us more about constructivism, as paintings provide stable, manifest and accessible physical outcomes of constructivist praxis, and that an application of cybernetic and constructivist principles to painting can advance the understanding of painting. Implications: Understandings of painting as well as other art forms can be better understood through including a broad cybernetic perspective in examining painting as a process and as a medium through which conversation takes place between observers, These understandings may have value in improving creative effectiveness among viewers and producers of art works. These understandings may have value for practitioners of other creative enterprises, and have potential to expand understandings in art history and art theory by emancipating it from being in service as a cultural emblem.

Key words: Mannerism, impressionism, photorealism, plein air painting, style, sensibility, hallucination, Parmigianino, Raphael, Salvador Dali, Pierre Bonnard, Humberto Maturana, Gordon Pask, Giorgio Vasari, Jackson Pollock

The disjunctive theory of perception claims that we should understand statements about how things appear to a perceiver to be equivalent to statements of a disjunction that either one is perceiving such and such or one is suffering an illusion (or hallucination); and that such statements are not to be viewed as introducing a report of a distinctive mental event or state common to these various disjoint situations.

Normal perception involves experiencing objects within perceptual scenes as real, as existing in the world. This property of “perceptual presence” has motivated “sensorimotor theories” which understand perception to involve the mastery of sensorimotor contingencies. However, the mechanistic basis of sensorimotor contingencies and their mastery has remained unclear. Sensorimotor theory also struggles to explain instances of perception, such as synesthesia, that appear to lack perceptual presence and for which relevant sensorimotor contingencies are difficult to identify. On alternative “predictive processing” theories, perceptual content emerges from probabilistic inference on the external causes of sensory signals, however, this view has addressed neither the problem of perceptual presence nor synesthesia. Here, I describe a theory of predictive perception of sensorimotor contingencies which (1) accounts for perceptual presence in normal perception, as well as its absence in synesthesia, and (2) operationalizes the notion of sensorimotor contingencies and their mastery. The core idea is that generative models underlying perception incorporate explicitly counterfactual elements related to how sensory inputs would change on the basis of a broad repertoire of possible actions, even if those actions are not performed. These “counterfactually-rich” generative models encode sensorimotor contingencies related to repertoires of sensorimotor dependencies, with counterfactual richness determining the degree of perceptual presence associated with a stimulus. While the generative models underlying normal perception are typically counterfactually rich (reflecting a large repertoire of possible sensorimotor dependencies), those underlying synesthetic concurrents are hypothesized to be counterfactually poor. In addition to accounting for the phenomenology of synesthesia, the theory naturally accommodates phenomenological differences between a range of experiential states including dreaming, hallucination, and the like. It may also lead to a new view of the (in)determinacy of normal perception.

Key words: Predictive coding, Presence, Sensorimotor contingencies, Veridicality, Counterfactuals, Synesthesia, Active inference, Bayesian brain.

Upshot: This interdisciplinary work draws on phenomenology, Indian philosophy, Tibetan Buddhism, cognitive neurosciences and a variety of personal and literary examples of conscious phenomena. Thompson proposes a view of consciousness and self as dynamic embodied processes, co-dependent with the world. According to this view, dreaming is a process of spontaneous imagination and not a delusional hallucination. This work aims at laying the ground for systematic neurophenomenological investigation of first-person experience.

A theory of the structure and cognitive function of the human imagination that attempts to do justice to traditional intuitions about its psychological centrality is developed, largely through a detailed critique of the theory propounded by Colin McGinn. Like McGinn, I eschew the highly deflationary views of imagination, common amongst analytical philosophers, that treat it either as a conceptually incoherent notion, or as psychologically trivial. However, McGinn fails to develop his alternative account satisfactorily because (following Reid, Wittgenstein and Sartre) he draws an excessively sharp, qualitative distinction between imagination and perception, and because of his flawed, empirically ungrounded conception of hallucination. His arguments in defense of these views are rebutted in detail, and the traditional, passive, Cartesian view of visual perception, upon which several of them implicitly rely, is criticized in the light of findings from recent cognitive science and neuroscience. It is also argued that the apparent intuitiveness of the passive view of visual perception is a result of mere historical contingency. An understanding of perception (informed by modern visual science) as an inherently active process enables us to unify our accounts of perception, mental imagery, dreaming, hallucination, creativity, and other aspects of imagination within a single coherent theoretical framework. Relevance: Argues for an enactivist approach to understanding perception, mental imagery, and imagination. Critiques Cartesian (including merely implicitly Cartesian) approaches to the same.