Draft:Alicia Juarrero

Alicia Juarrero is a philosopher and academic, recognized for her significant contributions to the fields of complex systems, neuroethics, and philosophy. She is known for her work on the theory of constraints and the applications of complex systems' models in understanding neural processes related to ethics and morality.

Juarrero completed her doctoral studies in philosophy at the University of Miami.

Professional life
Alicia Juarrero served as professor emerita of Philosophy at Prince George's Community College.

She is currently an Affiliate Scholar in Residence at the Neuroethics Studies Program of the Pellegrino Center for Clinical Bioethics, Georgetown University Medical Center.

Her research focuses on complex systems' models of neural processes involved in proto-moral, moral, and ethical cognition, emotions, and behavior.

Contributions to philosophy and ethics
Juarrero authored Dynamics in Action, a foundational text in understanding complexity in society. Her 2023 publication, Context Changes Everything: How Constraints Create Coherence, offers insights into intentional causation and relationships.

Juarrero's work has significantly influenced the study of complex systems in philosophy and ethics.

In Naturalizing Relevance Realization: Why agency and cognition are fundamentally not computational, the authors argue that Juarrero's theory of complex systems adaptive self-constraint has important implications in theories of autonomous agency and embodied rationality.

According to Juarrero, one useful way to think about biological organization is to separate the underlying processes (physico-chemical flows) from the higher-level constraints that impinge on them by reducing their dynamical degrees of freedom.

Other roles and achievements
Juarrero is the president and founder of VectorAnalytica, a firm specializing in complex systems and data analysis.

Publications










Talks

 * Context Changes Everything - Brain Inspired Podcast Episode 174 by Alicia Juarrero.


 * Alicia Juarrero on Context, Constraints, and Coherence - Jim Rutt Show Episode 191 (July 13, 2023).