MIT research finds the brain’s language-processing network also responds to artificial languages such as Esperanto and languages made for TV, such as Klingon on “Star Trek” and High Valyrian and Dothraki on “Game of Thrones.”
In previous work, Fedorenko and her students have found that computer programming languages, such as Python — another type of invented language — do not activate the brain network that is used to process natural language. Instead, people who read computer code rely on the so-called multiple demand network, a brain system that is often recruited for difficult cognitive tasks.
I’m curious if there’s some overlap between conlangs and programming languages, on the region level if not the network level. IIRC, the multiple demand network is a bit ill-defined and every region doesn’t necessarily activate for every task; and Fedorenko et al have their own idiosyncratic definition of the language network that omits anything that might also have other functions (including canonical regions like Broca’s and Wernike’s areas).
I’m curious if there’s some overlap between conlangs and programming languages, on the region level if not the network level.
I predict that, if there is such overlap, natural languages will also overlap the same way. Because in practice there’s no individual difference between a highly developed conlang and a natlang.
I suspect the motivation behind this study was to try to narrow down the deciding factor in the earlier study showing a difference between natural and programming languages—the next logical step would be looking at a more “artificial” conlang like Lojban (and/or a more “natural” programming language like ACE).
The end result will probably be some broader category of “language-network-interpretable” languages including natural and (some but maybe not all) conlangs.
I’m curious if there’s some overlap between conlangs and programming languages, on the region level if not the network level. IIRC, the multiple demand network is a bit ill-defined and every region doesn’t necessarily activate for every task; and Fedorenko et al have their own idiosyncratic definition of the language network that omits anything that might also have other functions (including canonical regions like Broca’s and Wernike’s areas).
I predict that, if there is such overlap, natural languages will also overlap the same way. Because in practice there’s no individual difference between a highly developed conlang and a natlang.
Sure.
I suspect the motivation behind this study was to try to narrow down the deciding factor in the earlier study showing a difference between natural and programming languages—the next logical step would be looking at a more “artificial” conlang like Lojban (and/or a more “natural” programming language like ACE).
The end result will probably be some broader category of “language-network-interpretable” languages including natural and (some but maybe not all) conlangs.