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abstract thought

·May 13, 2025·5 min read

AI LLMs Learn Like Us, But Without Abstract Thought

Summary: A new study finds that large language models (LLMs), like GPT-J, generate words not by applying fixed grammatical rules,...

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Featured Neuroscience Open Neuroscience Articles

·April 12, 2022·3 min read

How the Human Brain Evolved to Harness Abstract Thought

In other primate species, the brain areas that comprise the default mode network involve two systems that are not strongly connected to each other. The regions, one responsible for cognitive tasks and the other for the suppression of external events, appear to be only recently linked by evolution. This linkage may have facilitated the capacity for abstract thought that lead to the rapid evolution of human cognitive abilities.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·August 31, 2021·4 min read

Mapping the Brain Circuitry of Spirituality

Researchers find a region of the brain stem called the periaqueductal gray may mediate religiosity and spirituality in humans.

Featured Neuroscience Open Neuroscience Articles

·August 3, 2021·4 min read

The Creation of Abstract Thoughts in the Brain

Combining artificial intelligence, mathematical modeling, and brain imaging data, researchers shed light on the neural processes that occur when people use mental abstraction.

Featured Neuroscience

·March 9, 2020·2 min read

Sensory information underpins abstract knowledge

Neuroimaging reveals our brains combine information from different categories of sensory information to drive abstract knowledge.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·October 29, 2019·4 min read

Faith, truth and forgiveness: How your brain processes abstract thoughts

The human brain acts like an indexing system to help compose the meaning of abstract concepts.

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Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·August 10, 2019·6 min read

We like our math like we like our art: Beautiful

The average American can assess mathematical arguments for beauty just as they can for art or music. Using nine criteria for beauty, including elegance, intricacy, and universality, people were more likely to agree about the specific ways four different proofs were beautiful. The study sheds new light on broader issues in how and why humans have aesthetic experiences of abstract ideas.

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Featured Neuroscience

·July 10, 2019·5 min read

Expert mathematicians stumped by simple subtractions

Our knowledge of the world has a critical impact on the ability to use mathematical reasoning, even for mathematicians. Findings reveal math professionals can be duped by some aspects of their knowledge about the world and fail to solve simple fifth-grade math problems.