Searching for the virtual governor Listen to the full pod everywhere @DemystifySci

Your rebellion against the Giant Virtual Controller is time spent noticing, listening, and cherishing

Join us later today for more interdisciplinary perceptual control theory research & applications! linkedin.com/posts/warren-m… iapct.org/events/iapct-c… Claudius Osei CLaE ControlTheory Nicolas Jodal Kevin Mitchell Àlex Gómez-Marín TyfoodsForThought Mick Cooper Tom Froese, Embodied Cognitive Science Unit (ECSU) Anna Ciaunica @annaciaunica.bsky.social

Military Hardware to Mental Health: Perceptual Control Theory with Warre... youtu.be/Jo8YlophNQE?si… via YouTube

I believe that having the framework of perceptual control theory enables answers to real-life problems that are effortlessly multi-factorial, integrative, normalising, empowering, logical and resonant with experience. #popularpsychology #automation linkedin.com/posts/warren-m…

Dopamine & Learning Debunked nature.com/articles/s4146… Nature Neuroscience Neuroscience News Neuroskeptic 🇺🇦 The Lancet Neurology CLaE Kording Lab 🦖 Michael Levin Anil Seth Mark Solms Àlex Gómez-Marín Reinforcement Learning and Artificial Intelligence Ecological Theory of Reinforcement Learning Human Reinforcement Learning Team Tom Froese, Embodied Cognitive Science Unit (ECSU) Kevin Mitchell Carlos E. Perez Yin lab

“The basic assumption in traditional RL is that learning is expressed directly and immediately in performance. They therefore conflate learning with changes in performance… such models treat actions as simple, discrete choices, ignoring their spatial and temporal complexity.”

Reversing Coercion in the era of AI Paradoxical collective control & Consciousness #nexus #goliath #controltheory #Consciousness #ai #algorithms #mentalhealth youtu.be/mZe9D8u4di0?si…

So the question remains whether the additional statistical assumptions of FEP are necessary to validate its ubiquitous claim over all complex systems, or whether they obscure the core principles of control by living systems that are actually the essence of PCT…

Open Access Now: Why Psychopathology Research Should Avoid Studying One Mental Disorder at a Time: An Intergenerational and Developmental Evidence Base for Understanding “p” awspntest.apa.org/fulltext/2026-… Tim Dalgleish

Transdiagnostic Mental Health Network Translation of this body of work into policy, practice, public understanding and the cultural lexicon is long overdue.

Thrilled to announce my paper “Consciousness — The Control of Quality” accepted by New Ideas in Psychology! 🧠 It proposes consciousness as a disruption to optimum existence, enhancing interaction with the world & fading in Flow. 🔗 perceptualrobots.com/press/copoq/ #Consciousness #PCT

Are all people equally conscious? Exciting news — my latest paper has been accepted for publication in New Ideas in Psychology! 📘 Title: Consciousness: The Control of the Perception of Quality (CoPoQ) 👤 Author: Dr. Rupert Young 🧠 Journal: New Ideas in Psychology (Elsevier)

Rupert Young builds on Powers et al. (1960) with a detailed analysis of what is the nature of the controlled variable during conscious experience - perceived quality - comprised of qualia, valence & performance. A great primer on consciousness research and PCT too. See thread:

A. Explain homeostasis as control of input by intrinsic systems B. Explain behaviour as the control of perception C. Explain conflict D. Describe hierarchy of perception E. Explain reorganisation as the development of a learned perceptual hierarchy driven by intrinsic error

CYBERNETIC MIMESIS: Attempting to grok individual agency & collective phenomena, I have managed to combine: (1) a control theoretic model of individual agency with (2) a social theory of collective behavior to create (3) an agent based model producing realistic booms and busts.

Important work: modeling shows booms & busts in collective activities (economy, societal collapses) emerge from perceptual control agents with a goal to mimic one another. Mimicry supports collective action but risks arbitrary pursuits & collapse. Yuval Noah Harari Roman Krznaric

Now published in New Ideas in Psychology! 🧠 This new understanding of consciousness and human behaviour has profound implications for Artificial Intelligence including Autonomous Vehicles. If an artificial system cannot perceive and control quality it will never be able to

Maturana, von Glasserfield & Powers American Society for Cybernetics 1988 Bill Powers describes the history & concepts of perceptual control theory in these proceedings. The flaw of of assuming cause & effect still haunt neuroscience & psychology… asc-cybernetics.org/publications/T…

“Goals rather than predictions determine the sense of agency” This 2025 study came out too late for my Prediction Illusion article, but it adds to the accumulating evidence that the nervous system specifies goals rather than predicts outcomes of action. cell.com/iscience/fullt…