A discussion is going on in cognitive science about the use of representations to explain how intelligent behavior is generated. In the traditional view, an organism is thought to incorporate representations. These provide an internal model that is used by the organism to instruct the motor apparatus so that the adaptive and anticipatory characteristics of behavior come about. So‐called interactionists claim that this representational specification of behavior raises more problems than it solves. In their view, the notion of internal representational models is to be dispensed with. Instead, behavior is to be explained as the intricate interaction between an embodied organism and the specific make up of an environment. The problem with a non‐representational interactive account is that it has severe difficulties with anticipatory, future oriented behavior. The present paper extends the interactionist conceptual framework by drawing on ideas derived from the study of morphogenesis. This extended interactionist framework is based on an analysis of anticipatory behavior as a process which involves multiple spatio‐temporal scales of neural, bodily and environmental dynamics. This extended conceptual framework provides the outlines for an explanation of anticipatory behavior without involving a representational specification of future goal states.
Pezzulo G. (2008) Coordinating with the future: The anticipatory nature of representation. Minds & Machines 18: 179–225. https://cepa.info/7537
Humans and other animals are able not only to coordinate their actions with their current sensorimotor state, but also to imagine, plan and act in view of the future, and to realize distal goals. In this paper we discuss whether or not their future-oriented conducts imply (future-oriented) representations. We illustrate the role played by anticipatory mechanisms in natural and artificial agents, and we propose a notion of representation that is grounded in the agent’s predictive capabilities. Therefore, we argue that the ability that characterizes and defines a true cognitive mind, as opposed to a merely adaptive system, is that of building representations of the non-existent, of what is not currently (yet) true or perceivable, of what is desired. A real mental activity begins when the organism is able to endogenously (i.e. not as the consequence of current perceptual stimuli) produce an internal representation of the world in order to select and guide its conduct goaldirected: the mind serves to coordinate with the future.
We examine Dubois’s (2003) distinction between weak anticipation and strong anticipation. Anticipation is weak if it arises from a model of the system via internal simulations. Anticipation is strong if it arises from the system itself via lawful regularities embedded in the system’s ordinary mode of functioning. The assumption of weak anticipation dominates cognitive science and neuroscience and in particular the study of perception and action. The assumption of strong anticipation, however, seems to be required by anticipation’s ubiquity. It is, for example, characteristic of homeostatic processes at the level of the organism, organs, and cells. We develop the formal distinction between strong and weak anticipation by elaboration of anticipating synchronization, a phenomenon arising from time delays in appropriately coupled dynamical systems. The elaboration is conducted in respect to (a) strictly physical systems, (b) the defining features of circadian rhythms, often viewed as paradigmatic of biological behavior based in internal models, (c) Pavlovian learning, and (d) forward models in motor control. We identify the common thread of strongly anticipatory systems and argue for its significance in furthering understanding of notions such as “internal”, “model” and “prediction”.
Recent discussions in cognitive science and the philosophy of mind have defended a theory according to which we live in a virtual world akin to a computer simulation, generated by our brain. It is argued that our brain creates a model world from a variety of stimuli; this model is perceived as if it was external and perception-independent, even though it is neither of the two. The view of the mind, brain, and world, entailed by this theory (here called “virtual world theory”) has some peculiar consequences which have rarely been explored in detail. This paper sets out virtual world theory (1. 1) and relates it to various central philosophical problems (indirect realism (1. 2), the role of the perceiver (1. 3) and the problem of the existence of the external world (1. 4)). The second part suggests three interpretations of virtual world theory, two familiar ones (a strong and a weak one, 2. 1) and a somewhat less familiar one (the irrealist interpretation, 2. 2). The remainder of the paper argues that the irrealist interpretation is the one we should adopt (2. 3–2. 6).