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The Free-Energy Principle: A Unified Brain Theory?

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Neuroscience Free Energy PrinciplePredictive Processing

By Karl Friston

Summary

All biological systems minimize variational free energy — a bound on surprise relative to a generative model of their environment. Subsumes predictive coding, active inference, and Bayesian brain. Conscious states = brain's best inferences about causes of sensory data.

Why It Matters

10,000+ citations. The most ambitious unifying framework in theoretical neuroscience. Connects consciousness to thermodynamics and self-organization.

Notes

This entry is a seed import from the Phase 1 Knowledge Inventory. It has not yet been manually reviewed.