Figure 2.

The figure depicts a notional active cognit embodying an emulation. A single emulation is instantiated by active neurons in many locations in the brain. In this case the organism is faced with a complex social situation, trying to break away from a conversation at a party in order to get some food. The emulation stores the possibility of the organism vocalizing his feeling of hunger and moving away from a speaker and toward the area containing food. The following points list the notional active areas and the cognitive control processes their participation embodies. (1) Motor planning – increased discharge rates in these frontal cortical neurons store the emulation's motor plan. In this case the motor plan consists of both vocalization and movement. Activity in Broca's area neurons (near 1a) store the vocalization plan, while activity in neurons in the premotor cortex (near 1b) and the cerebellum (near 1c) store the movement plan. If the sensory predictions in this emulation do not deviate too strongly from incoming sensation, the emulation emulation realization will occur as this emulation is advanced toward realization. Advancement of the emulation is enacted by a shift in frontal cortex activity from these association areas along the dark arrows toward the primary motor cortex, eventually resulting in the performance of the stored action. Note that activity from area 1b stores a representation of bodily movement, so that activity shifts to the region of the motor strip that controls the trunk and legs. Similarly, activity from area 1a stores a representation of speech, so that activity moves to the area of the motor strip that controls the mouth. (2) Sensory association – activity patterns in parietal (near 2a) and temporal (near 2b) association areas store higher-level overviews of the expected sensory environment, which is the cessation of speech directed at the organism and the view of movement toward the food. These sensory expectations are communicated to the primary sensory areas (3a,b,c), creating lower-level sensory representations of the expected environment. (3) Primary sensory – activity in primary sensory areas is influenced by both the incoming sensory information and top-down feedback from sensory association areas storing the sensory expectations. The interplay between these two influences produces Emulation-Guided Perception. If incoming information deviates significantly from the top-down expectations, then difference signals (not shown) are sent to the anterior cingulate cortex, triggering an error-related negativity, and emulation repair. The comparison between incoming sensory information and top-down feedback containing sensory expectations is the emulation monitoring process.