The Illusion of Internal Joy

International audienceJ. Schmidhuber proposes a "theory of fun & intrinsic motivation & creativity" that he has developed over the last two decades. This theory is precise enough to allow the programming of artificial agents exhibiting the requested behaviors. Schmidhuber's theory relies on an explicit 'internal joy drive' implemented by an 'information compression indicator'. In this paper, we show that this indicator is not necessary as soon as the 'brain' implementation involves associative memories, i.e., hierarchical cortical maps. The 'compression factor' is replaced by the 'smallest common activation pattern' in our framework, with the advantage of an immediate and plausible neural implementation. Our conclusion states that the 'internal joy' is an illusion. This remind us of the eliminative materialism position which claims that 'free-will' is also an illusion

On the Incommensurability of Feeling and Doing: The Illusion of Free Will. (Review of: Wegner, Daniel (2003) The Illusion of Conscious Will. MIT Press.)

Wegner’s book is on perceptual and motor illusions of free well and agency, but free will is much more profoundly illusory than any of the phenomena reported in his book. We never do anything because we feel like it, even it is feels as if we do, because feelings cannot have any independent causal power, on pain of telekinetic dualism

Book review\ud Andre, J., Owens, D. A., & Harvey, Jr., L. O. (Eds.). (2003). Visual perception: The influence of H. W. Leibowitz. Washington, DC: APA.

In the edifice of visual psychology there are many mansions. This book comes from one of the finest in it.\ud The influence of Herschel Leibowitz has been immense (e.g., teaching in four languages and publishing\ud more than 250 papers) blending rigorous inquiry with inspirational teaching and dedicated public\ud service. This “Decade of Behavior” festschrift is exemplary in many respects, such as giving a readable\ud account of complicated vision problems, as bridging applied and theoretical questions, as to the\ud productiveness of cross-disciplinary collaboration, and, last but not least, to the significance of an\ud inspirational teacher, mentor, and colleague. Reading the book will give you a kind of immersion experience,\ud typical in style of the man himself. The book primes the pump and lets the reader go on an inspirational journey

Transformational Potential: The Changing Face of God and of Self in the Realm of Science and Spirit

In this paper, the author examines the function and process of defining God, the Divine, or Ultimate Reality as a developmental process that begins in early childhood and continues throughout life. She draws from psychological object relations theories to describe transitional and transformational phenomena as creative processes that combine the objective and subjective dimensions of reality and to illustrate that defining God and meaning-making are relational processes. She draws from neuroscience and technology to support and illustrate the transformational process as a means of constantly defining, relating to, and making-meaning of oneself, God, and the Universe

An Analytic View of Delusion

The present article proposes a logical account of delusions, which are regarded as conclusions resulting from fallacious arguments. This leads to distinguish between primary, secondary, ..., n-ary types of delusional arguments. Examples of delusional arguments leading to delusion of reference, delusion of influence, thought-broadcasting delusion and delusion of grandeur are described and then analyzed. This suggests finally a way susceptible of improving the efficiency of cognitive therapy for delusions

Pedagogy of recognition: Winnicott, Honneth and learning in psychosocial spaces

This paper explores the links between Donald Winnicott and Axel Honneth in relation to developing a pedagogy based on recognition. Winnicott's understanding of emotional development is centred on the intimate infant/mother dyad, in which the notions of ‘good enough mothering’, potential spaces and the true and false self are central to developing a sense of selfhood. Honneth’s three part model of relating-to-self proposes that the recognition of others has an impact on constructing an identity that has social and cultural value. A synthesis of these two approaches provides a pedagogical framework based on mutual recognition with caring relationships. For example, ‘good enough’ (m)others are able to recognise and acknowledge that the infant is deserving of love, which leads to a learner who has the self-confidence to feel as though their efforts are of value. Recognition that learners have autonomy and can participate in playful potential spaces provides self-respect to enable learners to separate and be active agents. Finally, the wider recognition that individuals are valued and contribute to the community provides learners with a meaningful sense of self that has sufficient self-esteem for a creative and spontaneous true self to encounter learning throughout the lifespan

A Master Wittgensteinian Surveys Human Nature -A Review of Human Nature-the Categorial Framework by PMS Hacker (2010) (review revised 2019)

Materialism, reductionism, behaviorism, functionalism, dynamic systems theory and computationalism are popular views, but they were shown by Wittgenstein and more recently by Searle to be incoherent. The study of behavior encompasses all of human life but behavior is largely automatic and unconscious and even the conscious part, mostly expressed in language (which Wittgenstein equates with the mind), is not perspicuous, so it is critical to have a framework which Searle calls the Logical Structure of Rationality (LSR) and I call the Descriptive Psychology of Higher Order Thought (DPHOT). After summarizing the framework worked out by Wittgenstein and Searle, as extended by myself and by modern reasoning research, I comment on this first book in a trilogy on Human Nature by P.M.S. Hacker, the leading authority on Wittgenstein and one of the best modern philosophers. Those wishing a comprehensive up to date framework for human behavior from the modern two systems view may consult my book ‘The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle’ 2nd ed (2019). Those interested in more of my writings may see ‘Talking Monkeys--Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet--Articles and Reviews 2006-2019 3rd ed (2019), The Logical Structure of Human Behavior (2019), and Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st Century 4th ed (2019