The prominent role of the cerebellum in the social learning of the phonological loop in working memory: How language was adaptively built from cerebellar inner speech required during stone-tool making

Larry Vandervert; Larry Vandervert

doi:10.3934/Neuroscience.2020020

AIMS Neuroscience

2020, Volume 7, Issue 3: 333-343. doi: 10.3934/Neuroscience.2020020

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The prominent role of the cerebellum in the social learning of the phonological loop in working memory: How language was adaptively built from cerebellar inner speech required during stone-tool making

Larry Vandervert ^,

American Nonlinear Systems, 1529 W. Courtland Ave. Spokane, WA 99205, USA

Received: 08 July 2020 Accepted: 30 August 2020 Published: 16 September 2020

Based on advances in cerebellum research as to its cognitive, social, and language contributions to working memory, the purpose of this article is to describe new support for the prominent involvement of cerebellar internal models in the adaptive selection of language. Within this context it has been proposed that (1) cerebellar internal models of inner speech during stone-tool making accelerated the adaptive evolution of new cause-and-effect sequences of precision stone-tool knapping requirements, and (2) that these evolving cerebellar internal models coded (i.e., learned in corticonuclear microcomplexes) such cause-and-effect sequences as phonological counterparts and, these, when sent to the cerebral cortex, became new phonological working memory. This article describes newer supportive research findings on (1) the cerebellum's role in silent speech in working memory, and (2) recent findings on genetic aspects (FOXP2) of the role of silent speech in language evolution. It is concluded that within overall cerebro-cerebellar evolution, without the evolution of cerebellar coding of stone-tool making sequences of primitive working memory (beginning approximately 1.7 million years ago) language would not have evolved in the subsequent evolution of Homo sapiens.
- cerebellar internal models,
- cerebellar sequence detection,
- cerebellum,
- FOXP2,
- inner speech,
- language evolution,
- phonological loop,
- stone-tool making,
- working memory
Citation: Larry Vandervert. The prominent role of the cerebellum in the social learning of the phonological loop in working memory: How language was adaptively built from cerebellar inner speech required during stone-tool making[J]. AIMS Neuroscience, 2020, 7(3): 333-343. doi: 10.3934/Neuroscience.2020020

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Abstract

Based on advances in cerebellum research as to its cognitive, social, and language contributions to working memory, the purpose of this article is to describe new support for the prominent involvement of cerebellar internal models in the adaptive selection of language. Within this context it has been proposed that (1) cerebellar internal models of inner speech during stone-tool making accelerated the adaptive evolution of new cause-and-effect sequences of precision stone-tool knapping requirements, and (2) that these evolving cerebellar internal models coded (i.e., learned in corticonuclear microcomplexes) such cause-and-effect sequences as phonological counterparts and, these, when sent to the cerebral cortex, became new phonological working memory. This article describes newer supportive research findings on (1) the cerebellum's role in silent speech in working memory, and (2) recent findings on genetic aspects (FOXP2) of the role of silent speech in language evolution. It is concluded that within overall cerebro-cerebellar evolution, without the evolution of cerebellar coding of stone-tool making sequences of primitive working memory (beginning approximately 1.7 million years ago) language would not have evolved in the subsequent evolution of Homo sapiens.

Conflict of interest

The author declares no conflict of interest in this article.

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