An Emergentist Account of Language in the Brain—Seeking Neural Synergies Behind Human Uniqueness

Abstract

Cognitive neuroscience has become increasingly open to views of human cognitive faculties as emergent properties—as higher-level products of synergies between brain structures handling qualitatively different functions. This new perspective mitigates claims that cognitive abilities are tied to localized, domain-specific brain systems. In this changing landscape, the neurobiology of language has lagged behind, with virtually no mature theory apt to guide an exploration of language as an emergent function of the human brain. Combining evidence that linguistic processing is distributed across neurocognitive systems supporting (among others) semantic cognition, executive functions, and articulatory-motor control with recent advances in studying neural synergies, we propose a model of language as a deeply synergistic phenomenon that is both decoupled from its lower-level constituents and capable of exerting downward causal powers over them, accounting for its key role in human adaptive behavior. In considering the implications it has in our understanding of the place of language within the broader infrastructure of human behavior, this novel perspective aims to move the neurobiology of language forward in a new era of the cognitive neuroscience.