{"title":"Non-Markovian systems, phenomenology, and the challenges of capturing meaning and context - comment on Parr, Pezzulo, and Friston (2025).","authors":"Mahault Albarracin, Dalton A R Sakthivadivel","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2523889","DOIUrl":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2523889","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Parr, et al., explore the problem of non-Markovian pro cesses, in which the future state of a system depends not only on its present state but also on its past states. The authors suggest that the success of transformer networks in dealing with sequential data, such as language, stems from their ability to address this non-Markovian nature through the use of attention mechanisms. This commentary builds on their discussion, aiming to link it to some notions in Husserlian phenomenology and explore the implications for understanding meaning, context, and the nature of knowledge.</p>","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-2"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144559411","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Ryan Singh, Alexander Tschantz, Christopher L Buckley
{"title":"Paying attention to process.","authors":"Ryan Singh, Alexander Tschantz, Christopher L Buckley","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2520313","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17588928.2025.2520313","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-2"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144552432","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Beyond prediction: comments on the format of natural intelligence.","authors":"Elliot Murphy","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2521403","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17588928.2025.2521403","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-4"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144324646","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Beyond individuals: Collective predictive coding for memory, attention, and the emergence of language.","authors":"Tadahiro Taniguchi","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2518942","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17588928.2025.2518942","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-2"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144316040","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"How deep will you go? Hierarchy in predictive coding and transformers.","authors":"Jeffrey F Queißer, Henrique Oyama, Jun Tani","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2518945","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17588928.2025.2518945","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-3"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144316041","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Auditory facilitation in deterministic versus stochastic worlds.","authors":"Berfin Bastug, Urte Roeber, Erich Schröger","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2497762","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17588928.2025.2497762","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The brain learns statistical regularities in sensory sequences, enhancing behavioral performance for predictable stimuli while impairing behavioral performance for unpredictable stimuli. While previous research has shown that violations of non-informative regularities hinder task performance, it remains unclear whether predictable but task-irrelevant structures can facilitate performance. In a tone duration discrimination task, we manipulated the task-irrelevant pitch dimension by varying transition probabilities (TP) between successive tone frequencies. Participants judged duration, while pitch sequences were either deterministic (a rule-governed pitch pattern, TP = 1) or stochastic (no discernible pitch pattern, TP = 1/number of pitch levels). The tone pitch was task-irrelevant and it did not predict duration. Results showed that reaction times (RTs) were significantly faster for deterministic sequences, suggesting that predictability in a task-irrelevant dimension still facilitates task performance. RTs were also faster in two-tone sequences compared to eight-tone sequences, likely due to reduced memory load. These findings suggest that statistical learning benefits extend beyond task-relevant dimensions, supporting a predictive coding framework in which the brain integrates predictable sensory input to optimize cognitive processing.</p>","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-7"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-04-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143969935","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Beyond Markov: Transformers, memory, and attention.","authors":"Thomas Parr, Giovanni Pezzulo, Karl Friston","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2025.2484485","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17588928.2025.2484485","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This paper asks what predictive processing models of brain function can learn from the success of transformer architectures. We suggest that the reason transformer architectures have been successful is that they implicitly commit to a non-Markovian generative model - in which we need memory to contextualize our current observations and make predictions about the future. Interestingly, both the notions of working memory in cognitive science and transformer architectures rely heavily upon the concept of attention. We will argue that the move beyond Markov is crucial in the construction of generative models capable of dealing with much of the sequential data - and certainly language - that our brains contend with. We characterize two broad approaches to this problem - deep temporal hierarchies and autoregressive models - with transformers being an example of the latter. Our key conclusions are that transformers benefit heavily from their use of embedding spaces that place strong metric priors on an implicit latent variable and utilize this metric to direct a form of attention that highlights the most relevant, and not only the most recent, previous elements in a sequence to help predict the next.</p>","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-19"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143984568","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Visuo-spatial working memory abilities modulate mental rotation: Evidence from event-related potentials.","authors":"Binglei Zhao, Sergio Della Sala, Elena Gherri","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2024.2409715","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17588928.2024.2409715","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In the present study, we investigated whether differences in spatial working memory (SWM) abilities - assessed through the Corsi block task (CBT) - impact the processes of mental rotation (MR) engaged during a classic letter rotation task. Based on the median split of their scores in the CBT, participants were divided into a higher and a lower SWM group. Behavioral and electrophysiological data were recorded while participants completed the MR task and were compared across groups. Higher error rates were observed in individuals with lower than higher SWM scores, while no RT differences emerged. Systematic group differences were observed before and during the MR process of canonical letters. A delayed onset of the event-related potential (ERP) rotation-related negativity (RRN), a reliable psychophysiological marker for MR processes, was observed in the lower SWM group for all rotation angles, suggesting that a longer time is needed to generate a mental representation of familiar stimuli in individuals with lower SWM scores. Furthermore, a delayed RRN offset indicating the end of the MR process and longer RRN durations suggesting longer MR processes were found for letters with larger rotation angles (i.e. 120°, 150°) in individuals with lower SWM scores on canonical character trials. These observed group differences provided evidence for the debated issue of the interaction between SWM and MR, suggesting that SWM plays a role in both the initial phase to generate the mental representation of familiar objects and during the MR process, especially for larger angles.</p>","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"1-12"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142459575","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cognitive NeurosciencePub Date : 2024-07-01Epub Date: 2024-09-21DOI: 10.1080/17588928.2024.2403340
Guy Dove
{"title":"How to build a better 4E cognition.","authors":"Guy Dove","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2024.2403340","DOIUrl":"10.1080/17588928.2024.2403340","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Mougenot and Matheson outline a theoretical approach to cognitive neuroscience that combines the commitments of embodied cognition with a mechanistic approach to scientific explanation. They argue that this theoretical approach provides several general benefits, including enabling researchers to develop more robust theories and ontologies that do not require either neuroscientific reductionism or the complete autonomy of psychology from neuroscience. In this commentary, I argue that the sort of embodied cognitive neuroscience that they envision has a more specific benefit: it has the potential to help resolve internal tensions within 4E cognition.</p>","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"104-105"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142281404","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Cognitive NeurosciencePub Date : 2024-07-01Epub Date: 2024-09-21DOI: 10.1080/17588928.2024.2403339
Shaun Gallagher
{"title":"Mosaic or kaleidoscope: tensions between mereology and etiology.","authors":"Shaun Gallagher","doi":"10.1080/17588928.2024.2403339","DOIUrl":"10.1080/17588928.2024.2403339","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Ecological and enactive approaches to embodied cognition endorse a concept of constitution that involves dynamical causality. I argue that this is a challenge for new mechanistic accounts which hold to a strict distinction between causality and constitution.</p>","PeriodicalId":10413,"journal":{"name":"Cognitive Neuroscience","volume":" ","pages":"106-107"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142281407","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}