Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T16:31:22.820Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Markov blankets as boundary conditions: Sweeping dirt under the rug still cleans the house

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 September 2022

Javier Sánchez-Cañizares Open the ORCID record for Javier Sánchez-Cañizares [Opens in a new window]
Javier Sánchez-Cañizares*
Affiliation:
Mind-Brain Group at the Institute for Culture and Society (ICS), University of Navarra, 31009 Pamplona, Spain js.canizares@unav.es https://www.issr.org.uk/fellows/user/496/
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Bruineberg et al. underestimate the ontological weight of Markov blankets as actual boundaries of systems and lean toward an instrumentalist understanding thereof. Yet Markov blankets need not be deemed mere tools. Determining their reality depends on the fundamental problem of distinguishing between system and environment in physics, which, in turn, demands a metaphysical bedrock backed by a realist stance on science.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 45 , 2022 , e207
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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

Friston, K. J., Wiese, W., & Hobson, J. A. (2020). Sentience and the origins of consciousness: From Cartesian duality to Markovian monism. Entropy, 22(5), 516. https://doi.org/10.3390/E22050516CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Juarrero, A. (2002). Complex dynamical systems and the problem of identity. Emergence, 4(1), 94–104.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lombardi, O., Fortín, S., & Castagnino, M. (2012). The problem of identifying the system and the environment in the phenomenon of decoherence. In de Regt, H. W., Hartmann, S. & Okasha, S. (Eds.), The European philosophy of science association proceedings: Amsterdam 2009 (pp. 161–174). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-2404-4_15CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Longo, G., & Montévil, M. (2014). Perspectives on organisms: Biological time, symmetries and singularities. Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Owen, M. (2020). Aristotelian causation and neural correlates of consciousness. Topoi, 39(5), 1113–1124. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-018-9606-9CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Owen, M. (2021). Circumnavigating the causal pairing problem with hylomorphism and the integrated information theory of consciousness. Synthese, 198, 2829–2851. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02403-6CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sánchez-Cañizares, J. (2016). Entropy, quantum mechanics, and information in complex systems: A plea for ontological pluralism. European Journal of Science and Theology, 12(1), 17–37.Google Scholar
Sánchez-Cañizares, J. (2021). The free energy principle: Good science and questionable philosophy in a grand unifying theory. Entropy, 23(2), 238. https://doi.org/10.3390/e23020238CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sánchez-Cañizares, J. (2022a). Formal causation in integrated information theory: An answer to the intrinsicality problem. Foundations of Science, 27, 77–94. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-020-09775-wCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sánchez-Cañizares, J. (2022b). Integrated information theory as testing ground for causation: Why nested hylomorphism overcomes physicalism and panpsychism. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 29(1–2), 56–78. https://doi.org/10.53765/20512201.29.1.056CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tegmark, M. (2015). Consciousness as a state of matter. Chaos, Solitons and Fractals, 76, 238–270. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chaos.2015.03.014CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilczek, F. (2015). A beautiful question. Finding nature's deep design. Penguin Press.Google Scholar