Predictive processing, well-being, and wisdom w/ Mark Miller - Voices with Vervaeke

This is Mark's second time on the channel and as always we catch fire at the cutting edge of Cognitive Science!!
The Predictive Dynamics of Happiness and Well-Being:
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1...
The Contemplative Science Podcast:
www.thecontemplativescientist...
Website: markdmiller.live
Twitter: @PredictiveLife

[@thesame6258]

I am so grateful to be one of the scroungers of internet faithfully consuming voices with Vervaeke 😊

[@josiahhughes5204]

"we're not even trying to have anymore just have the appearance of having" wow this whole thing was so amazing

[@jillm3487]

I have consumed quite a lot of your content, and this was my favorite recent Voices with Vervaeke. Useful to me. Clear and compelling conversation. What a treat. Thank you

[@forecast_hinderer]

I concur 100%. So easily digestible. Useful to many I expect.

[@Valosken]

This is the good stuff. This is the sort of thing that will revolutionise our culture and take us out of the meaning crisis.

[@gettingtogive]

Absolutely fantastic guys. Thank you both so much 🙏

[@BrettPAndersen]

Really glad I gave this a listen. Chock-full of insights and also introduced me to some stuff I wasn't familiar with (the Sandved Smith paper!). The idea that most psychopathology is due to 'sticky' beliefs/habits is really concordant with the idea that I am arguing for in my video series (which was argued by Peterson in Maps of Meaning), that the highest value is not anything static, but is rather the (destructive and creative) process by which our beliefs/values are updated. Great conversation!

[@thejoyfrontier1540]

Thank you, John.

[@word-pictures]

Wow, another brilliant/insightful conversation. Not sure I've ever seen John this excited during a conversation. So fun to watch two smarties gettin' giddy with it.

[@sheilac5319]

I'll be listening again to better take in this episode. But it's truly a delight to see Mark Miller back, and to hear JV and him in discussion again. Many thanks.

[@joshc5727]

John has such a true love for the pursuit of wisdom

[@Holonbutoh]

It's adorable to see that John and Mark love each other! Really amazed by this content as the previous one with Mark. Something which seems really potent in these talks is that u guys can make old traits of wisdom and self-transcendence talk to cog science in a smooth way and more importantly in a way that is grounded in the depths of phenomenological participation. I hope you do a serie together one day!!

[@HugaHoodie95]

I would LOVE for you guys to do more talks. There's something that happens when the two of you get together -- the conversation just reaches whole different levels. Also John you're the first person who's articulated a worldview i feel able to truly connect with with since Nishitani -- it's this kind of mystical non-nihilism or something i think it might be changing my life, genuinely. Thank you both

[@scott555]

I heard 20+ things I needed to hear in this chat. Thanks to you both for continuing to mine this vein and sharing what you've found.

[@lizellevanwyk5927]

So many roads to go down in this conversion! 😅❤

[@sylviekaiser1064]

On fire!!!

[@das3841]

These are the best!!!

[@gammaraygem]

Where I live, winters require at least 8m3 of firewood. The past 20 years I got that amount well in advance...finding dry firewood midwinter is a hassle and you risk sitting in the cold, for weeks or months. This winter, I did not collect "enough" firewood, only 3m3. I just felt no incentive to collect any more. So, I wondered: why... will I die before winter ends? ( I am 69).Will the world end? Will I move to another country? It never occurred to me that this winter would be extremely warm. No need for firewood except for a couple of weeks. I learned to listen to and trust my body...it is the body that gives me the signs to listen to.Beyond stats and logic. On shorter term, when my body starts tidying up the living room, I know that I can expect visitor(s) within 24 hours. Practising mental silence, eyes open, brought this.

[@alexandrazachary.musician]

Spinning Plato’s. Awesome!!! This is so exciting!!! Thank you so much ❤️🙏🏽💋

[@leedufour]

Thanks Mark and John!

[@johnvervaeke]

Thanks Lee.

[@MatthewJohnCrittenden]

I enjoy all the convers(z)ations around this cyber corner but this stood out with it's practical advice towards living a better life. Thanks.

[@ScottMannion]

Excellent conversation partner. Active listening on both sides rather than people playing out a routine.

[@ericarzt9128]

Mark Miller is brilliant. I've watched both podcast you have done with him more then once. I look forward to reading his paper and seeing him back here again.

[@BcClarity]

I Love your expression of JOY John! To meet a mind and create new concepts for us to entangle in our minds. Blessings and Much Love Sophia Knows

[@GuildOfTheBlackCrow]

So enlightening, i had to watch twice. It's fun seeing John get his his mind blown.

[@Matterful]

Thank you both so much.

[@abdurhmanalzayed9429]

This amazing Duet never dissapoints us; very enlightening...You guys have tapped into the core origin of all psychic suffering and laid out the authentic way to self actualization and optimal wellbeing. If such advanced Realization becomes mainstream the drug and pharmaceutical companies will go bust. I would just add that positive valence or pleasurable happiness is not only felt when we do better than expected (dopaminergic prediction error) in realizing our goal, but also while regular tuning and pursuit(encoded by serotonin)of our valuable goal e.g. reading a book, exercising, praying, engaging in a conversation etc God bless you. Deeply grateful 💜.

[@fredsk8x]

Beautiful & deeply insightful Dialogue, Thank you both

[@Andrew.baltazar]

Loved this very much. So many insights. Thank you!

[@accidentallyconceived]

this conversation is an absolute bomb. Thank you.

[@mikeallison6764]

Beautiful! Really, really enjoyed this!

[@johnvervaeke]

Thanks Mike.

[@georgehill9353]

Yes this was a great Sunday listen.

[@_ARCATEC_]

Rawls of the game

[@dianasiedek4357]

Excellent conversation! Loved it!

[@ubik1106]

Excellent content

[@thejoyfrontier1540]

What a wonderful conversation! Watching you both track ideas and process expressively in real time adds a huge level of relevant data to the content being discussed. Seeing two great minds at the edge of their being sets contrast alight in oneself. The webbing of our intellectual constructions resonates with lived experience encoded as referential strategy, and so one should indeed know thyself. --- Mark's last point on what might take one into the loop of reciprocal opening and John's "tightening" of the concept was especially poignant. "Try to change a little, the expectation. Try to, today, just set the intention to know what it's like to be you." -Mark “If you are gonna do the "know yourself better throughout the day", this is not about reviewing your autobiography endlessly. Our culture loves that. This is about, like I said, your owners manual. Pay attention, learn. Learn about the machinery of your cognition. Learn about the machinery of your affect, learn about the connections between the machinery of your cognition, your affect, and your embodied movement in the world.” Closing summary by John on a knowing thyself and reciprocal opening.

[@forscherr2]

I'd love to see Dr. Peterson as part of this conversation about predictive processing and bring in the mythological representation of these chaos-order dance. Btw: this was really great - thank you for sharing this!

[@maggen_me7790]

Wisdom are turning John into a Wizard!

[@RickDelmonico]

There is resource acquisition as an adaptive behavior where the balance between exploitation and exploration must be continually tuned.

[@OsKaRR]

Golden

[@HugaHoodie95]

Bizarro metaphysics is a gem of a term

[@KoreyFoolStrike]

John, have you heard of David Chaim Smith? A conversation between you two would be fascinating

[@Walkabout]

Please discuss the relation of self and society with the other - the suffering other.

[@jasonreed1352]

The reward pathways, when activated such that individuals are inclined to blindly cooperate to do that which destroys the individual's ecosystem, are equally, if not eventually MORE, dangerous than any effects of any scapegoated substance which is said to trick the reward pathways and are therefore the error-in-thinking-pattern to most helpfully focus our conscious attention on. Our unconscious cognitive processes are far less naïve than that. And that we are stuck on internal "warring" against everything we think ails us (war on drugs, war on poverty, war on terrorism, war on "insert any established and named collective who have ever justified going to war for any reason") is why, despite our "healthcare systems" and "systems of justice" and "systems of governance" are immensely profiting, and the individuals embodying the agency of the chairs of those institutions are immensely idealized, our actual health continues to decline and the actual orderliness and genuine worthiness of us to continue existing as the arbiters of our own society decline as well. Take another couple steps back, and observe again. Much love

[@RickDelmonico]

Do not say "I am wise", say "I am less foolish".

[@dls78731]

Really like this. Thinking of the Rationalists working to be "less wrong" it makes a lot of sense to start striving for what it really means to be "less foolish."

[@dls78731]

I'm also really intrigued at how this almost forces us to concede that wisdom cultivation is a collective effort. The capacity to discern foolish behavior is so much more difficult in isolation, and yet, with collective habits of culture, crowds/groups can make it difficult to deviate from previously proven paths. I'm called back to a video between John Vervaeke and Jordan Hall a year ago regarding David Graeber's "Debt: The First 5000 Years" ( kzbin.info/www/bejne/oHbQfWqEr5qNe9E ). The abstraction of money/debt and the evaluation of whether dopamine levels are optimal is key. An optimizing organism becomes sub-optimal when it gets too sticky in its framing options. And yet, when one is more depleted, they may be less able to invoke a frame shift, making it more likely to get stuck. Human's have likely been the right level of stuck in a kind of meta-metabolism (economy), but are now needing to shift gears and find new economic framing (Game B-ish) which is expensive to do, but necessary. We must start to discern when our "optimal" grip is too optimal (oxymoron), in other words, a death-grip on the truth, which religions that ARE religions almost always fall back into. Even Mindfullness, when held too tightly is suboptimal!

[@jaycarpenter9287]

​I greatly appreciate it-thank you very much-concerning that is of the opportunity accordingly therefore/therein to 👍.

[@WackyConundrum]

Fantastic conversation! Can't wait for the next one with dr Miller. One question I was wondering about throughout the entire video. Miller conceptualizes positive affect with performance above expectation (doing better than you anticipated). But what about genuine surprise? What about situations when something happens you had no idea would happen (as it wasn't even related to what you were actively pursuing/doing), that nonetheless gives you pleasure?

[@notmyrealpseudonym6702]

If you follow Friston's work on predictive processing (free energy principle) he does talk about "surprisal" and "expectation violation". Expectation isn't the same as intentional or deliberated belief. It isn't always consciously experienced before the event and may need an event for it to emerge O be realised. A simple example. I live in Chch, NZ. The earthquakes in 2010 were beyond people's expectation, despite knowledge of them at a propositional and in some cases perspectival level. It was the lack of prior deliberated expectation, such as earthquake drills and insurance before the fact, that was the surprise. I'm not sure if I agree with Dr Miller's positive affect as performance better than anticipation ... But have yet to fully listen. There is a paper by Friston, Peters and McEwing that posits there are two possible changes when there is an expectation violation and his account would only account for one of the possibilities ... And also then raises the question of how the body/person/self translates between anticipation and performance.

[@WackyConundrum]

@@notmyrealpseudonym6702 Exactly. There are at least two relevant meanings of "surprise". One would be about "doing better" or "doing worse" than expected/anticipated. The other one would be a general concept of a signal that is somewhat "abnormal" as it is different from the pattern; as in the information theory. Both positive surprises lead to increased affect. Yet, dr Miller focuses only on one of them.

[@notmyrealpseudonym6702]

@@WackyConundrum he mentions around the 18-20:00 point their model also includes a rate of change component as much as a presence or absence of change component. (I have a child, I awake and if I have no child or 2 children both are surprises with a need for different actions to make sense of them. I live constantly at 20°, I'm suddenly at 0 or 40° both are surprises with a need for different actions to make sense of them). The action of making sense of them - sweating or shivering brings me from allostasis to homeostasis - and this is a positive thing physiologically as it reduces energy expenditure ... But it doesn't account for psychology where my action of improvement - I kidnap a child or murder one - would reset my original expectation. Is why active inference can be paired with perceptual inference and the perceptual update brings positive affect as much as action could (a change is as good as a holiday approach) It is a quibble and possibly a truncated argumentation by Miller for ease of conversation more than an oversight on his behalf as his paper references Friston amongst others. The single path of action concept he states would be the addiction model (stimulus response) and reciprocal narrowing if it didn't have a perceptual equivalent (stimulus responses or pre-sponse) but also a teleological/comparative aspect (stimulus responses outcomes of which one is preferable). Predictive processing bakes the teleological and value into the morphological/bodily process of the organism ... Which I agree with but it doesn't solve the problem so much as shift the goal posts and make the observer/researcher feel as if they have solved the problem. We shift from pathoanatomical to pathophysiological to pathobehavioural to pathorelational without considering pathoobservational traits of the observer (John briefly mentions this in ontological formulation of pathos in psyche-pathology series no. 5 near the start ... And I have considered as part of my professional practice) My concern, as voiced by Terence Deacon, Alice Juarrero, and Evan Thompson, is that the value component has to be "smuggled in" to the process and is neither observable nor detectable in the process per se. I suspect JV gets around this with his concept of transjective, a systems approach in which the relationship of body to world would provide the valence ... However it would need a third aspect, such as a teleological or comparative aspect, to determine a better or worse to allow for well being. So a comparison of transjective possibilities or a "metajective ... Superjective??" ... Throw a neologism in there. This used to be "god" as an arbitrated yardstick of better or worseness to compare to. All missing of the marks are sins, some sins are of excess and in small amounts could be virtues or in right contexts may be appropriate type thinking. Which is why Mark Millar considers around the 18-19.00 point with "pathology" being adaptive or "ethologic(?)" in other contexts. Predictive processing is a description of a predictive process and not a prediction or prescription of a predictive process.

[@nicklaurence318]

Loved this, thank you John and Mark, and loved the paper as well. I'm curious if anyone can point me towards the literature on mind-wandering and insight that was referenced at @43:47, sounds really interesting

[@danielstonebrook104]

We have an infrastructure of the finite but it is this literacy in what is literal that over shadows and over assimilated to apathy to approach anyway towards unnecessary, unspoken, understanding that all is allowable is immediately derived and defined as having been experienced in two dimensions. The end of history the world is in direct contrast of the artificial we are trading excellence and beauty for essential essence of becoming.

[@williamjmccartan8879]

Appearing to have, sounds a lot like a poser. Incredible amount of ground covered today, thank you both Mark and John.

[@nathanfisher9386]

This is really wonderful, thank you both! Any chance y'all (individually or together) can sometime in the future explore a bit where Relevance Realization and Active Inference may disagree or have differing perspectives? I am currently having a hell of a time wrapping my mind around the similarities and differences between 4E cog sci (and enactivism most specifically), RR, and the family of approaches under the Predictive Processing umbrella. While the past two videos with Mark have been wonderful at bringing attention to some of the similarities or resonances, I also know that people in the Enactive camp have recently argued there are fundamental incompatibilities between autopoiesis/enaction and the Free Energy principal and PP/active inference frameworks (see Di Paolo et al (2021) "Laying down a Forking Path" for example). Since Jon often invokes Evan Thompson and his work in glowing terms--including in these videos--and seemingly sees his work as built on and continuous with it AND the fact that Evan Thompson is one of the loudest voices criticizing FEP and arguing for its incompatibility with his work...and then we have these two videos celebrating all the continuity between Jon and Mark's work, I could use some help making sense of where everyone stands! Thanks so much

[@johnvervaeke]

This an excellent point and I will talk to Mark about this.

[@nathanfisher9386]

@@johnvervaeke Thank you! in the first video, Mark shared that anecdote in response to Shaun Gallagher's question (see Gallagher et al (2021) "Predictive Processing and some Disillusions about Illusions" in this vein too btw if you haven't) about locating himself in the 'north sea' in relation to Clark's somewhat intermediary position on representation vs. Kiverstein in Amsterdam and anti-representational enactivist positions--which was helpful--but would be wonderful to hear more from him fleshing out the 'north sea' perspective as well as hearing where you see yourself on this and other fault lines in these debates. But thanks again, these dialogues are really the best thing on the internet

[@lizellevanwyk5927]

Again: entropy as catalyst of creation. This time creating an insight. 43:18

[@bbllrd1917]

When will the 3 books following the one about zombies come out? In the CV found on your UofT page it says they're expected for 2019 👀

[@HugaHoodie95]

Please could you link some potential papers/books on the multi-aspectuality phenomenon? The whole discussion on the strange through-line between multi-aspectuality and the multi-perspectival is incredible

[@danynata9337]

I think the same!

[@mills8102]

I look forward to the development of an AI that can analyze individual (sic) practitioners and prescribe what practice(S) best suit their needs on a particular day, week, month, hour, moment, etc. creating an optimal fluid program for personal enhancement with variable objectives.

[@sumayyabhorat790]

Belief sets are the bedrock of meaning making, crucial to making sense of ourselves and our worlds, they 'crystallise' through very early life experiences, are subconscious i.e. out of our awareness, they are the lenses through which we interpret and react to ALL life experiences... they do seek evidence to maintain themselves , therefore are hyper vigilant for confirmatory evidence in everyday experiences and may even distort contradictory evidence to 'fit' the belief system, so as to minimize dissonance, which is extremely uncomfortable... it is a dysregulated salience system which has developed to maintain the integrity of the SELF... which is absolutely crucial above ALL else, once physical security is established.

[@lizellevanwyk5927]

When Mark mimes the analogy of spinning plates (around 59:00) I actually start to feel a bit anxious. Too many spinning plates doesn’t seem like a recipe for well-being to me. Prefer the simple life. I am sure this affective response does not get to the meaning of his words. But I worry that this reinforces the idea that one has to be super productive and ‘busy’ in order to have a good life.

[@spambotfodder]

the conversation around the 1hr5min mark explains EXACTLY how masochists process pain. Don't ask me why I know this.

[@ulackh8tred]

I ching = Hidden pattern(s) of archetypes through the " no thing" aspect?

[@_ARCATEC_]

Utillich 💓tilliology

[@danynata9337]

Holy cow...

[@jgarciajr82]

🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯

[@clintnorton4322]

This explains how the mistaken perspective of one overarching consciousness became a religion. By describing how religions become a local point of focus.

[@domenicmolinaro6580]

Pornography seems like a particularly vicious "feedback loop" vampire. It's well-known that pornography users seek novel or surprising stimulus to get the same experience as previously, which is why users go deeper and deeper into more unusual ot extreme porn. The "better than expected" atta-boy dopamine (or whichever chemical) hit is also deeply tied to mating instincts, so misleads the user into thinking it's a great grip, but it's a tremendously fake grip that causes errors in one of the most important arenas for well-being in the real world (success in mating/intimate relationships). The rate of "reward" also increases the more you browse and click in the infinite expanse, yet there is no hard limit to intake as there is with opioids or other physical drugs

[@_ARCATEC_]

Curiesive

[@angusdouglas530]

Why all the marketing up front.

[@BrickThink]

Interesting talk. I've never seen a man so complexly describe the basic structure of every good children's story. Everything you're trying to understand has already been understood through literature. You seem to be giving complex language (dialogues) and well-read reference drama to an already solved problem. To what end? What is your goal?

[@BrickThink]

Less is infinitely more if you know what "more" truly is.

[@gammaraygem]

Mind does not really want to "know". It just wants to chew and chew...they havent figured that out yet. They are in carrot and stick mode.

[@jankan4027]

it just seems to be the same. In fact, they use concepts that explain something, unlike fairy tales, which have a completely different function.

[@BrickThink]

@@jankan4027 Then what they are saying is for arbitrary enjoyment.