Models are only as good as the tools available for testing them. Is there any perspective on testing the proposals about syntactic brain processes discussed to this point?

Making Predictions

One obvious prediction of the neuronal grammar framework is that the cortical processes following a sentence in the input are of different types. Such process types include the following:

• Ignitions of word webs

• Ignitions of sequence sets

• Downward or upward regulation of activity by threshold control

• Reverberation and priming of neuronal sets

It may be possible to investigate these putative processes using neurophysiological recording techniques. Because the relevant activation and deactivation processes likely occur within tenths or hundredths of a second, it is advisable to use fast neuroimaging techniques in the investigation of serial-order information processing.

At first glance, one straightforward way of transforming any of the mentioned simulations into predictions about neurophysiological processes appears to be by calculating sum activity values at any time step of a simulation, and by thereby obtaining a series of activity values.

However, this strategy is not so straightforward as it appears at first glance because several parameters must be chosen beforehand. The relative weighting of the activity states is one set of parameters that appears to distinguish between pronounced activity changes – those induced by ignitions and regulation processes – and smaller ones – as, for example, those caused by the spreading of priming or reverberation. As an additional set of parameters, the time constants of individual processes must be specified.