Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-hgkh8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-29T12:13:00.527Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Infer yourself: Interoception and internal “action” in conscious selfhood

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 November 2016

Anil K. Seth*
Affiliation:
Department of Informatics, Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science, University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QJ, United Kingdom. a.k.seth@sussex.ac.ukwww.anilseth.com

Abstract

Can consciousness be understood through an association with voluntary skeletomotor action selection? Although flexible and integrated action selection is a plausible function for consciousness, a narrow focus on skeletomotor control neglects the contributions to conscious selfhood and subjectivity that rest on interoception and autonomic regulation (internal “action”). I consider these issues from the perspective of predictive processing.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Balcetis, E. & Dunning, D. (2010) Wishful seeing: More desired objects are seen as closer. Psychological Science 21(1):147–52. doi: 10.1177/0956797609356283.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Clark, A. (2013) Whatever next? Predictive brains, situated agents, and the future of cognitive science. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 36(3):181204. Available at: http://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X12000477 Google Scholar
Conant, R. & Ashby, W. R. (1970) Every good regulator of a system must be a model of that system. International Journal of Systems Science 1(2):8997.Google Scholar
Damasio, A. R. (1994) Descartes' error. Macmillan.Google Scholar
Friston, K. J. (2009) The free-energy principle: A rough guide to the brain? Trends in Cognitive Sciences 13(7): 293301.Google Scholar
Friston, K. J., Daunizeau, J., Kilner, J. & Kiebel, S. J. (2010) Action and behavior: A free-energy formulation. Biological Cybernetics 102(3):227–60. doi: 10.1007/s00422-010-0364-z.Google Scholar
Haggard, P., Clark, S. & Kalogeras, J. (2002b) Voluntary action and conscious awareness. Nature Neuroscience 5(4):382–85. doi: 10.1038/nn827.Google Scholar
Hohwy, J. (2013) The predictive mind. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Merker, B. (2005) The liabilities of mobility: A selection pressure for the transition to consciousness in animal evolution. Consciousness and Cognition 14(1):89114. doi: 10.1016/S1053-8100(03)00002-3.Google Scholar
Parkinson, J. & Haggard, P. (2014) Subliminal priming of intentional inhibition. Cognition 130(2):255–65. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2013.11.005.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schachter, S. & Singer, J. E. (1962) Cognitive, social, and physiological determinants of emotional state. Psychological Review. 69:379–99.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Seth, A. K. (2013) Interoceptive inference, emotion, and the embodied self. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 17(11):565–73. doi: 10.1016/j.tics.2013.09.007.Google Scholar
Seth, A. K. (2015) The cybernetic bayesian brain: From interoceptive inference to sensorimotor contingencies. In: Open MIND, ed. Metzinger, T. K. & Windt, J. M., pp. 124. MIND Group.Google Scholar
Seth, A. K., Verschure, P., Blanke, O., Butz, M., Ford, J. M., Frith, C. D., Jacob, P., Kyselo, M., McGann, M., Menary, M., Morsella, E. & O'Regan, J. K. (2016) Action-oriented understanding of consciousness and the structure of experience. In: The pragmatic turn: Toward action-oriented views in cognitive science, ed. Engel, A. K., Friston, K. J., & Kragic, D., pp. 261285. [Strüngmann Forum Reports, vol. 18; Lupp, J., series editor]. MIT Press.Google Scholar
Vishton, P. M., Stephens, N. J., Nelson, L. A., Morra, S. E., Brunick, K. L. & Stevens, J. A. (2007) Planning to reach for an object changes how the reacher perceives it. Psychological Science 18(8):713–19. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2007.01965.x.CrossRefGoogle Scholar