Behavioral and Brain Sciences 26 (3):261-283 (2003)
|Abstract||Neural correlates exist for a basic component of
logical formulae, PREDICATE(x). Vision and audition research in
primates and humans shows two independent neural pathways; one
locates objects in body-centered space, the other attributes
properties, such as colour, to objects. In vision these are the
dorsal and ventral pathways. In audition, similarly separable
“where” and “what” pathways exist. PREDICATE(x) is a schematic
representation of the brain's integration of the two processes
of delivery by the senses of the location of an arbitrary
referent object, mapped in parietal cortex, and analysis of the
properties of the referent by perceptual subsystems. The brain
computes actions using a few “deictic” variables pointing to
objects. Parallels exist between such nonlinguistic variables
and linguistic deictic devices. Indexicality and reference have
linguistic and nonlinguistic (e.g., visual) versions, sharing
the concept of attention. The individu