Which Comes First? Prediction or Action?

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We may seem to sense first and act second. But in your brain, sensing actually comes second. Our brain is wired to prepare for action first.

Yes, your brain is wired to initiate your actions before you’re aware of them. After all, in everyday life, you do many things by choice, right? At least it seems that way. But the brain is a predicting organ. It launches your next set of actions based on your past experience and current situation, and it does so outside of your awareness. In other words, your actions are under the control of your memory and your environment. Does this mean you have no free will? Who’s responsible for your actions?

The predictions that initiate your actions don’t appear out of nowhere. Your brain predicts and prepares your actions using your past experiences. If you could magically reach back in time and change your past, your brain would predict differently today, and you might act differently and experience the world differently as a result.

It’s impossible to change your past, but right now, with some effort, you can change how your brain will predict in the future. You can invest a little time and energy to learn new ideas. You can curate new experiences. You can try new activities. Everything you learn today seeds your brain to predict differently tomorrow.

Your Brain is a Prediction Organ

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In a very real sense, predictions are just your brain having a conversation with itself. A bunch of neurons makes their best guess about what will happen in the immediate future, based on whatever combination of past and present that your brain is currently conjuring. Those neurons then announce that guess to neurons in other brain areas, changing their firing. Meanwhile, sense data from the world and your body inject itself into the conversation, confirming (or not) the prediction that you’ll experience as your reality.

In actuality, your brain’s predictive process is not quite so linear. Usually, your brain has several ways to deal with a given situation, and it creates a flurry of predictions and estimates probabilities for each one. Is that rustling sound in the forest due to the wind, an animal, an enemy fighter, or a shepherd? Is that long, brown shape a branch, a staff, or a rifle? Ultimately, in each moment, some prediction is the winner. Often, it’s the prediction that best matches the incoming sense data, but not always. Either way, the winning prediction becomes your action and your sensory experience.

So, your brain issues predictions and checks them against the sense data coming from the world and your body.

If your brain has predicted well, then your neurons are already firing in a pattern that matches the incoming sense data. That means this sense data itself has no further use beyond confirming your brain’s predictions. What you see, hear, smell, and taste in the world and feel in your body in that moment are completely constructed in your head.

By prediction, your brain has efficiently prepared you to act. When your predicting brain is right, it creates your reality. When it’s wrong, it still creates your reality, and hopefully, it learns from its mistakes: Your brain incorporates the prediction errors and updates its predictions, so it can predict better next time around.