"Every aspect of our brain and body can be predicted from our environment."
Karl Friston is a Professor of Imaging Neuroscience at University College London and Principle Research Fellow for the Wellcome Trust. Friston is a former President of the International Organization for Human Brain Mapping, an elected fellow of the Royal Society and is the recipient of numerous awards including the Minerva Golden Brain Award, the Collège de France Medal, and the Glass Brain Award from the Organization for Human Brain Mapping.
Friston is a key architect of the 'free energy principle', a theoretical framework suggesting the brain reduces surprise by making predictions based on internal models and updating them using sensory input. Friston's work has been invaluable to the scientific community, making him one of the most highly cited living scientists in the world.
"One of the world's leading neuroscientists [who] has developed a theory of how the brain works that also has implications for the origin and nature of life" — Sean Carroll