robf:
Also, the brain is structuring this stuff, language, with the express purpose of making it meaningful to another individual. Another reason is to structure speech in a way the brain finds meaningful.
I don’t think there is anything particularly mysterious about how the brain finds meaning in things, anyway. Or perhaps it seems that way to me because I’m used to the way language manifests structure. Either way, it seems obvious to me that the brain structures the world in ways that help it predict cause and effect: grouping things that share contexts/predictions.
The foundation of language is grounded in the brain’s structures that are most closely associated with motor-sensory aspects of objects. The Chomsky “built-in” language features are certainly built around this grounding. While you are at it, look at figure two of the linked Pulvermuller paper and reflect on how it suggests an RNN architecture.
When I google Mirror Neurons I get in excess of 8 million hits on google. This is certainly a popular topic sparking much conjecture on both empathy and how they come to be.
From the linked wiki article: “To date, no widely accepted neural or computational models have been put forward to describe how mirror neuron activity supports cognitive functions.[13] [14] [15] The subject of mirror neurons continues to generate intense debate. In 2014, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B publi…