Dr. Jennifer Groh

related to the thought using that sensory motor infrastructure of the brain.

So the theory is that like maybe when you think about a cat, for example, or you think the concept of a cat, that the mental instantiation of that or the brain mechanism instantiation of having that thought is to run a little simulation in visual cortex that kind of includes what a cat looks like.

A simulation in auditory cortex that what does the cat sound like?

And as I'm telling you this, I'm, you know, I've used the word cat.

What color cat are you thinking?

Right.

And so you had no hesitation in telling me the color and adding an additional sensory quality.

Right.

so that's a you know it's a bit of a just so story but i think that it's a plausible possibility that that's in fact what's happening when we think and

You know, some of what kind of tangentially supports this is that we have many more sensory areas of the brain than monkeys do, than, you know, more distant mammalian relatives do.

As if what might have happened to allow us to become so smart is to, you know, make extra copies of some of these sensory areas.

areas of the brain.

And then when you have an extra copy, you're no longer so constrained, right?

We don't really see or hear any better than monkeys do.

So what's this extra tissue doing for us?

Possibility is that we're using it to generate these simulations and that running these simulations is kind of what thought is.

well, it might just be the only game in town.

It provides an explanation for why you might, you know, be driving on the freeway and having to merge into difficult traffic and telling your passenger, okay, be quiet.

I've got to pay attention now.

Like why would speech impair you from visual motor if it wasn't all part of a kind of cognitive system