Podcast with Paul Verschure & Tony Prescott on synthetic psychology and robot models

What would it take to build a true science of the mind , one that combines brain theory, robotics, and behavior into a unified framework? Paul Verschure and Tony Prescott reflect on a decade of interdisciplinary research at the intersection of neuroscience, psychology, and engineering, asking whether synthetic models can finally deliver the explanatory theories that biology alone has failed to produce. Subscribe for more from the Convergent Science Network podcast series. In this special episode, Verschure and Prescott turn the microphone on each other to discuss the intellectual foundations behind the BCBT summer school and the Living Machines conference. Starting from the famous Rosenbluth and Wiener argument that understanding complex biological systems requires building simplified physical models, they examine why robots offer something animal models cannot: complete access to every parameter, behavioral realism, and the ability to test sufficiency of a theory in real time. The conversation traces a lineage from cybernetics through Breitenberg's synthetic psychology to their own Distributed Adaptive Control framework. Central to the discussion is the tension between top-down behavioral modeling and bottom-up neural circuit analysis. Verschure describes how abstract behavioral models and detailed hippocampal simulations have converged to unlock new features like vicarious trial and error and mental time travel in robotic systems. Prescott pushes back on the limits of sufficiency arguments, advocating for completeness and convergent validation across multiple levels of description. Both agree that neuroscience suffers from an excess of technology-driven data and a deficit of genuinely explanatory theory , a gap that synthetic psychology is uniquely positioned to fill. The episode also features a candid exchange with Christine Aicardi on responsible research and innovation within large-scale projects like the Human Brain Project, exploring the limits of collective reflection as an ethical framework and the structural challenges of implementing responsible governance in science. Part of the Convergent Science Network podcast series from the BCBT Summer School.