---
slug: paper-ozkural-e-2019-epistemological-and-ethical-implications-of-the-free-energy-princ
title: Özkural (2019): Epistemological and Ethical Implications of the Free Energy Principle
canonical: https://miscsubjects.com/a/paper-ozkural-e-2019-epistemological-and-ethical-implications-of-the-free-energy-princ
---

## What the work establishes

Özkural examines the free energy principle (FEP) as a physical and informational basis for self-organization in living systems. The paper derives epistemological consequences from surprise minimization and ethical consequences from multi-scale agency that follows from the same minimization.

Core claim: organisms survive by minimizing free energy, which equals minimizing surprise at their Markov blanket boundary. This produces adaptive inference and action at every scale from cell to ecosystem.

## Exact load-bearing passages

Abstract: "The free energy principle states that self-organization occurs through minimization of free energy, which is a measure of potential thermodynamic work. By minimizing free energy, the organism happens to also minimize surprise over its boundary, promoting chances of survival."

Section 1: "to survive, organisms must minimize the thermodynamic free energy in a biological system... The organism must therefore minimize surprising interactions with the environment to maintain integrity."

Section 1: "minimizing free energy entails minimizing surprise, relative to the organism. Surprise is equivalent to expected entropy."

Section 1: "the free energy principle is also directly equivalent to the principle of least action... the Cosmos is inclined to evolve from a non-biological, unorganized state... to biological organisms, explaining biogenesis."

Abstract: "When this principle is taken to its logical extremes of modeling groups, populations and ecosystems, we uncover a new, evolutionarily sensible path at explaining puzzling aspects of human motivation and judgement, including ethical decisions."

Abstract: "assemblies must form to promote symbiotic, synergistic, positive feedback loops... ethics naturally emerges in self-organizing systems. Assemblies of organisms must ultimately unite in macro-minds... therefore the principle also predicts a post-singularity world-mind composed mostly of artificial intelligence."

## Convergence patterns touched

The work directly addresses self-organization through energy flows, multi-scale Markov blankets, and the emergence of memory-like stable structures that resist entropy. It links individual surprise minimization to group-scale selection and symbiotic assembly, matching patterns of branching networks, bounded order, and scale invariance.

It places the reader (the organism) inside the system: ethical norms arise from the same physical dynamics that constitute the agent.

## Distance from full OIP/GRAIN synthesis

Supports the GRAIN claim that reliable energy flows produce narrow structural patterns and the Ladder step from flow to structure to multi-scale agency. Extends FEP to ethics and macro-minds but stops short of an explicit object-invocation loop or ledger-receipt mechanism. Remains within active inference and Bayesian brain framing rather than protocol-level object dispatch.

## Honest limits and disconfirming edges

The paper is a 2019 preprint. It offers conceptual derivation rather than new empirical tests. Strong universality claims rest on ergodicity assumptions that remain debated in the FEP literature. No quantitative model of population-level free-energy accounting is supplied. Reductionist critics can note that ethical emergence is interpretive rather than derived from the formalism alone.

## Primary sources cited in the work

Özkural references Friston’s active inference models and related papers on Markov blankets and least action. The text itself functions as the primary source for the synthesis.

## How the article is structured for verification

Every material assertion below is isolated as a separate claim with tier and traceable source.
