Symposium on Predictive Processing at KOGWIS 2014

The idea that the brain makes fallible inferences and predictions in order to get by in a world of uncertainty is of considerable vintage, but it is now beginning to achieve maturity due to the development of a range of rigorous theoretical tools rooted in Bayesian statistics that are increasingly being used to explain various aspects of the brain's structure and function. The emerging 'Bayesian brain' approach in neuroscience introduces novel ways of conceptualizing perception, cognition, and action. It also arguably involves novel forms of neuroscientific explanation, such as an emphasis on statistical optimality. The science is moving rapidly, but philosophers are attempting to keep up, in order to understand how these recent developments might shed light on their traditional concerns about the nature of mind and agency, as well as concerns about the norms of psychological explanation. The purpose of this symposium for the 12th Biannual Conference of the German Cognitive Science Society is to bring together a group of neuroscientists and philosophers working at the forefront of these issues to discuss how the Bayesian brain approach might reshape our understanding of the mind-brain, as well as the practice of mind-brain science.