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I must start this review by admitting a potential source of bias; namely I had been sent this book to review before it was published when it was still at proof stage. I liked what I read, and said so, and a comment of mine can be found on the back of the book, encouraging others to read it. So when I was approached to review it for this journal, I initially demurred, saying that my views were known and that I would not be bringing a neutral gaze to bear on this second reading. But I was persuaded that this would be no bar to the review and I am glad to have had a second chance to review this book, which needs careful reading and rereading.
Professor Holmes is making a complex argument which attempts to integrate current theories of brain function with attachment theory, psychoanalytic concepts, and the practice of psychotherapy. One of the hardest tasks for this reviewer has been to work out how to summarise briefly an argument which it takes Holmes at least half of his book to describe; and which draws on Bayesian theories of probability, Karl Friston's model of mind, and the Helmholtz model of mind as an “inference making machine”. Holmes himself invites us to see this book as an argument for a paradigm called the Free Energy Principle (FEP), which he believes is the twenty-first century account of Freud's original drive-based model of mind.
Holmes is arguing that the brain operates according to an FEP, which reduces entropy and disorder in terms of incoming unbound energy. The brain's task is a homeostatic one and FEP maintains homeostasis by predicting, on the basis of past experience, the likely meanings of energy inputs to the brain. Put (very) simply, FEP brain notes discrepancies between prediction and sensation and acts to minimise those discrepancies which are experienced as painful (Prediction Error Minimisation (PEM)). Holmes suggests that many people who seek psychotherapy are suffering distress which arises from chronic unresolved distress arising from d