BMI SEMINAR // The Projective Consciousness Model: Integrating perception, imagination, emotion and action in a global cybernetic framework

The Projective Consciousness Model (PCM) (Rudrauf et al, 2017) is an
attempt to unify psychology computationally, with the broadest possible
explanatory power about a multiplicity of phenomena and behaviours, from
perception, imagination, appraisal, emotion, social cognition,
motivation, and action. The PCM advances previous formulations of active
inference by featuring an explicit psychological and cybernetic model of
the form, structure and dynamics of conscious experience, formulated as
a formal Field of Consciousness, integrating 3D projective geometry and
the Free Energy principle (Friston, 2010). The model  integrates
counterfactual or multi-perspectival first-person perspectives with
affective dynamics, for the global optimisation of action outcomes. The
PCM offers an explicit, formal, computable and integrative basis for
testing hypotheses about normal and pathological psychological
mechanisms quantitatively. The principles of the model will be
explained, and will be illustrated with applications to: perception,
focusing on visual illusions; artificial agent simulations of resilient
navigation in the context of affective stressors based on imaginary
projections in the future; social perspective taking in the context of
modeling joint attention and Autism Spectrum Disorders, using both
artificial agent simulations and initial implementations in collective
robots; the modeling of emotion dynamics and the generation of complex
facial expressions as a function of affective states; and theory-laden
neuro-computational predictions for parametric neuroimaging experiments.
We will discuss perspectives around the model for strong AI and
autonomous robotics,  as a basis for designing interpretable social
artificial agents and more generally as a method for psychological science.