This paper describes a multi-disciplinary initiative to promote collaborative research in enactive artificial cognitive systems by developing the iCub: a open-systems 53 degree-of-freedom cognitive humanoid robot. At 94 cm tall, the iCub is the same size as a three year-old child. It will be able to crawl on all fours and sit up, its hands will allow dexterous manipulation, and its head and eyes are fully articulated. It has visual, vestibular, auditory, and haptic sensory capabilities. As an open system, the design and documentation of all hardware and software is licensed under the Free Software Foundation GNU licences so that the system can be freely replicated and customized. We begin this paper by outlining the enactive approach to cognition, drawing out the implications for phylogenetic configuration, the necessity for ontogenetic development, and the importance of humanoid embodiment. This is followed by a short discussion of our motivation for adopting an open-systems approach. We proceed to describe the iCub’s mechanical and electronic specifications, its software architecture, its cognitive architecture. We conclude by discussing the iCub phylogeny, i.e. the robot’s intended innate abilities, and an scenario for ontogenesis based on human neo-natal development.

This paper provides an accessible introduction to the cognitive systems paradigm of enaction and shows how it forms a practical framework for robotic systems that can develop cognitive abilities. The principal idea of enaction is that a cognitive system develops it own understanding of the world around it through its interactions with the environment. Thus, enaction entails that the cognitive system operates autonomously and that it generates its own models of how the world works. A discussion of the five key elements of enaction – autonomy, embodiment, emergence, experience, and sense-making – leads to a core set of functional, organizational, and developmental requirements which are then used in the design of a cognitive architecture for the iCub humanoid robot.

Key words: Enaction, enactive systems, cognition, autonomy, embodiment, emergence, experience, sense-making.

Open peer commentary on the article “Investigating Extended Embodiment Using a Computational Model and Human Experimentation” by Yuki Sato, Hiroyuki Iizuka & Takashi Ikegami. Upshot: The target article’s findings on the focus of attention in extending an agent’s body schema are consistent with those in developmental psychology and neuroscience on goal-directed action. The consequences of these findings are that embodiment can be extended in a variety of ways, not all of which require direct physical manipulation.

Open peer commentary on the article “Homeostats for the 21st Century? Simulating Ashby Simulating the Brain” by Stefano Franchi. Upshot: The association of heteronomy with Ashby’s work in the target article follows from a direct interpretation of the second edition of Ashby’s book Design for a Brain. However, the first edition allows for an alternative – opposite – interpretation that is compatible with autonomy and autopoiesis. Furthermore, a more balanced perspective is suggested to avoid unintentionally giving the casual reader a misleading impression that the homeostat is Ashby’s ultimate position on homeostasis and that it is an adequate model of the brain.

In the enactive paradigm of cognitive science, development plays a crucial role in the realization of cognition. This position runs counter to the computational functionalism upon which cognitivist and classical artificial intelligence systems are founded, especially the assumption that cognition can be achieved by embedding pre-formed knowledge. The enactive stance involves a progressive phased transition from cognitive capacity to cognitive capability, highlighting the role of development in extending the timescale of a cognitive agent’s prospective abilities and in expanding its repertoire of effective action. We review briefly some necessary conditions for cognitive development, drawing on examples from developmental psychology, illustrating the ideas by looking at the ontogenesis of instrumental helping and collaboration in infants, and identifying some of the essential elements of a developmental cognitive architecture. We then focus on the fact that enactive systems are operationally-closed, autonomous, and self-maintaining. Consequently, there are organizational constitutive processes at play as well as behavioural ones. Reconciling these complementary processes poses a significant challenge for the creation of complete model of development that must show how constitutive autonomy is compatible with and may even give rise to behavioural autonomy. We conclude by drawing attention to recent research which could provide a way of addressing this challenge.

Key words: behavioural autonomy cognitive architecture constitutive autonomy development enaction ontogeny phylogeny value systems

Open peer commentary on the article “What Is a Cognizing Subject? Construction, Autonomy and Original Causation” by Niall Palfreyman & Janice Miller-Young. Upshot: I highlight certain aspects of the target article’s arguments and identify additional support that reinforces both the foundations of the argument and its conclusions.

Autopoiesis is a very powerful way of looking at and dealing with autonomous systems. It also has some major implications for the philosophy of science. Unfortunately, it is not clear in what philosophical context one should go about using autopoiesis. In this paper, we look at these issues, touching upon the inadequacies of conventional (positivistic) ontologies and philosophies of science, and we briefly describe an alternative relativistic ontology. We argue that self-organization is a necessary condition for autonomous systems and we highlight the difficulties that this raises for conventional representational approaches to autonomous systems. We discuss a methodology for discourse in relativistic ontology (Systematics) and, based on this, we argue in favour of a spectrum of autonomy. In a sister as a particular instance of autonomy in this spectrum. We proceed to describe the progress which has been made towards the development of a computational simulation of autopoietic organization, beginning with a formulation in terms of the calculus of indications (incorporating Varela’s extensions to include autonomous forms), and incorporating the Systematic formulation.

In a sister paper, we have looked at the philosophical aspects of the development of autonomous systems, touching upon the inadequacies of conventional (positivistic) ontologies and philosophies of science, and we have described an alternative relativistic ontology. We argued that self-organization is a necessary condition for autonomous systems and we highlighted the difficulties that this raises for conventional representational approaches to autonomous systems. We discussed a methodology for discourse in relativistic ontology (Systematics) and, based on this, we argued in favour of a spectrum of autonomy. In this paper, we try to show how autopoiesis can be interpreted as a particular instance of autonomy in this spectrum. We now proceed to describe the progress which has been made towards the development of a computational simulation of autopoietic organization, beginning with a formulation in terms of the Calculus of Indications (incorporating Varela’s extensions to include autonomous forms), and incorporating the Systematic formulation.

The reciprocal coupling of perception and action in cognitive agents has been firmly established: perceptions guide action but so too do actions influence what is perceived. While much has been said on the implications of this for the agent’s external behavior, less attention has been paid to what it means for the internal bodily mechanisms which underpin cognitive behavior. In this article, we wish to redress this by reasserting that the relationship between cognition, perception, and action involves a constitutive element as well as a behavioral element, emphasizing that the reciprocal link between perception and action in cognition merits a renewed focus on the system dynamics inherent in constitutive biological autonomy. Our argument centers on the idea that cognition, perception, and action are all dependent on processes focussed primarily on the maintenance of the agent’s autonomy. These processes have an inherently circular nature – self-organizing, self-producing, and self-maintaining – and our goal is to explore these processes and suggest how they can explain the reciprocity of perception and action. Specifically, we argue that the reciprocal coupling is founded primarily on their endogenous roles in the constitutive autonomy of the agent and an associated circular causality of global and local processes of self-regulation, rather than being a mutual sensory-motor contingency that derives from exogenous behavior. Furthermore, the coupling occurs first and foremost via the internal milieu realized by the agent’s organismic embodiment. Finally, we consider how homeostasis and the related concept of allostasis contribute to this circular self-regulation.