The Markov blankets of life: autonomy, active inference and the free energy principle

M Kirchhoff, T Parr, E Palacios… - Journal of The …, 2018 - royalsocietypublishing.org
This work addresses the autonomous organization of biological systems. It does so by
considering the boundaries of biological systems, from individual cells to Home sapiens, in …

[HTML][HTML] On Markov blankets and hierarchical self-organisation

ER Palacios, A Razi, T Parr, M Kirchhoff… - Journal of theoretical …, 2020 - Elsevier
Biological self-organisation can be regarded as a process of spontaneous pattern formation;
namely, the emergence of structures that distinguish themselves from their environment …

[HTML][HTML] The free energy principle made simpler but not too simple

K Friston, L Da Costa, N Sajid, C Heins, K Ueltzhöffer… - Physics Reports, 2023 - Elsevier
This paper provides a concise description of the free energy principle, starting from a
formulation of random dynamical systems in terms of a Langevin equation and ending with a …

[HTML][HTML] How particular is the physics of the free energy principle?

M Aguilera, B Millidge, A Tschantz, CL Buckley - Physics of Life Reviews, 2022 - Elsevier
The free energy principle (FEP) states that any dynamical system can be interpreted as
performing Bayesian inference upon its surrounding environment. Although, in theory, the …

A free energy principle for a particular physics

K Friston - arXiv preprint arXiv:1906.10184, 2019 - arxiv.org
This monograph attempts a theory of every'thing'that can be distinguished from other things
in a statistical sense. The ensuing statistical independencies, mediated by Markov blankets …

Self-supervision, normativity and the free energy principle

J Hohwy - Synthese, 2021 - Springer
The free energy principle says that any self-organising system that is at nonequilibrium
steady-state with its environment must minimize its (variational) free energy. It is proposed …

Memory and Markov blankets

T Parr, L Da Costa, C Heins, MJD Ramstead, KJ Friston - Entropy, 2021 - mdpi.com
In theoretical biology, we are often interested in random dynamical systems—like the brain—
that appear to model their environments. This can be formalized by appealing to the …

Living models or life modelled? On the use of models in the free energy principle

T van Es - Adaptive Behavior, 2021 - journals.sagepub.com
The free energy principle (FEP) is an information-theoretic approach to living systems. FEP
characterizes life by living systems' resistance to the second law of thermodynamics: living …

Markov blankets, information geometry and stochastic thermodynamics

T Parr, L Da Costa, K Friston - … Transactions of the …, 2020 - royalsocietypublishing.org
This paper considers the relationship between thermodynamics, information and inference.
In particular, it explores the thermodynamic concomitants of belief updating, under a …

Future climates: Markov blankets and active inference in the biosphere

S Rubin, T Parr, L Da Costa… - Journal of the Royal …, 2020 - royalsocietypublishing.org
We formalize the Gaia hypothesis about the Earth climate system using advances in
theoretical biology based on the minimization of variational free energy. This amounts to the …