Anil Seth

What is consciousness, and could AI have it? | The Voltaire Lecture 2025, with Professor Anil Seth Professor Anil Seth is a neuroscientist, author, and public speaker who has pioneered research into the brain basis of consciousness for more than 20 years

Join us online 31 October for this year’s #VoltaireLecture, where AI expert and neuroscientist Professor @anilseth.bsky.social will guide us through the science of AI, human consciousness, and what it means to be human in an age of increasingly ‘intelligent’ machines.

humanists.uk/events/volta...

Very sad, totally pointless, and actively damaging 👇🏽

What is consciousness, and could AI have it? | The Voltaire Lecture 2025, with Professor Anil Seth Professor Anil Seth is a neuroscientist, author, and public speaker who has pioneered research into the brain basis of consciousness for more than 20 years

Join us online 31 October for this year’s Voltaire Lecture, where AI expert and neuroscientist @anilseth.bsky.social ‬ will guide us through the science of AI, human consciousness, and what it means to be human in an age of increasingly ‘intelligent’ machines.

humanists.uk/events/volta...

A metaphysics for predictive processing - Synthese For predictive processing, perception is tied to the upshot of probabilistic inference, which makes perception internal, affording only indirect access to the world external to the perceiver. The meta...

Great to see this detailed response by Jakob @hohwy.bsky.social in Synthese to my challenge for predictive processing accounts, formulated in ‘PP’s flirt with transcendental idealism’ in Noûs.
@metzinger.bsky.social @anilseth.bsky.social @wanjawiese.bsky.social

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

It’s a great piece - as usual - thank you for writing it 🙏🏽

The quest to detect consciousness — in all its possible forms Insights from human brains might inform how scientists search for awareness in other animals and AI.

One of the biggest advances in #consciousness science is using brain scans to detect awareness in unresponsive people, researchers say. I wrote for @nature.com about these techniques and the growing efforts to test animals and AI for signs of an inner life.

The quest to detect consciousness — in all its possible forms Insights from human brains might inform how scientists search for awareness in other animals and AI.

Great piece by @marilenharo.bsky.social on the quest to detect consciousness. Great to see this important topic getting the attention it deserves!

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Congrats Fernando! 👇🏽

My PhD student Trevor Hewitt is conducting an online experiment into closed-eye visuals during psychedelic experiences. If you've had such an experience, please consider taking part at closed-eyes.com (it's only a short survey) - and/or help us spread the word. 🙏🏽🧠

If you are interested in pursuing a PhD in cognitive neuroscience, specially targeting conscious vs. unconscious processing, contact me. We are recruiting 🙏🧠 please RT

It's a thrill to see this project, led by @neuromorphicboki.bsky.social, see the light of day. It's led me to rethink how emergence and consciousness relate, and it's been an honour and pleasure to work on it with Boki and team (@thomasandrillon.bsky.social, Lionel Barnett, Olivia Carter).👇🏽

It's a thrill to see this project, led by @neuromorphicboki.bsky.social, see the light of day. It's led me to rethink how emergence and consciousness relate, and it's been an honour and pleasure to work on it with Boki and team (@thomasandrillon.bsky.social, Lionel Barnett, Olivia Carter).👇🏽

New ERC report on Europe’s competitiveness! 🇪🇺

"It conveyed a shared message that fundamental research is not a luxury.”

ERC President Maria Leptin on the conclusions from the ERC workshop with leading figures from industry, policy and science.

Read workshop report: erc.europa.eu/news-events/...

The Current and Future Burden of Long COVID in the United States Our computational model estimates the current burden of long COVID can range from $5084–$11 646 per case and $2.01–$6.56 billion in societal costs, assumin

"The current health and economic burden of long COVID may already exceed that of other chronic diseases and will continue to grow each year as more and more COVID-19 cases occur." academic.oup.com/jid/article/...

Is it time to bring back natural philosophy? - ABC listen Once upon a time, what we now call scientists were known as "natural philosophers". These were people who studied the physical universe through observation and logic, using philosophical methods and r...

Is it time to bring back natural philosophy? For ABC (Australia)'s "The Philosopher's Zone", I spoke with @seanmcarroll.bsky.social , @sandradmitchell.bsky.social @melaniemitchell.bsky.social , @anilseth.bsky.social , David Albert, and Alan Guth:
www.abc.net.au/listen/progr... #science #philosophy

It’s time to bring back natural philosophy! 👇🏽

The Mystery of Consciousness - The North Wall, Oxford In this live Big Think conversation, acclaimed neuroscientist Anil Seth takes us to the frontier of the enduring mystery of consciousness.

Oxonians! I'll be exploring "the mystery of consciousness" with none other than Jonny Thomson @philosophyminis.bsky.social at The North Wall Arts Centre on Sep 16th. Tickets are free - courtesy of @bigthink.com More details: www.thenorthwall.com/whats-on/big...

Great post #ASSC28 INTREPID workshop featuring in-depth meta science discussions of the state of affairs in consciousness science and of the value of adversarial collaborations

👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽

2/ .. & look out for two posters in the afternoon session (4:30pm), Will Yun-Farmbrough on "Modelling Gist Perception and Phenomenology with Natural Hybrid Predictive Coding Networks" & Lionel Barnett on "Short-run Cointegration for Neurophysiological Processes"

1/ Today at @assc28.bsky.social , @robertchisciure.bsky.social introduced his "Prolegomena to Phenomenomics: Toward a Future Science of Experiential Observers" (studio theatre, 9:30am, already in the past ...)

Experiment 2 results are now out in the wild! @assc28.bsky.social #assc2025

CORRECTION @neuromorphicboki.bsky.social is at 09:30 not 09:50 - the programme was updated

5/ ... and then in the afternoon poster session: "Is Conscious Perception Necessary to Direct Attention?" from Syrus Chen, Ryan Scott, and Zoltan Dienes

4/ Trevor Hewitt - "A Novel Questionnaire to Measure the Contents of Visual Hallucinations" - and many congrats to everyone who presented on a fantastic first day too!

3/ In the lunch poster session, don't miss @catmoar.bsky.social & @romybeaute.bsky.social "Comparing Complexity Measures for Distinguishing Conscious States", @pawelmotyka.bsky.social "Subjective and Physiological Effects of Phenomenologically Distinct Simulated Hallucinations in Virtual Reality" ..

2/ at 10:30am, also in the main hall, I will be co-chairing (w/ Cyriel Pennartz) a symposium on "Phenomenology And Neural Mechanisms Of Conscious Space Perception" - featuring new results from the INTREPID adversarial collaboration

1/ Today at @assc28.bsky.social from the Sussex Centre for Consciousness Science and friends: 9:50am, Kalokainouri Hall, @neuromorphicboki.bsky.social "Unfolding Sleep’s Emergent Dynamical Organisation in the Temporal and Spectral Domains"

Mixing my metaphors just a little, I do say that you “carefully and convincingly dismantle” the carpentered world hypothesis - precision sledgehammering!

Great piece by @bankfieldbecky.bsky.social 👇🏽