Consciousness before Language
Mart Wijn
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) October 12, 2026 preprint DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.23325537 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Key points | Proposes that phenomenal consciousness — bare, non-linguistic awareness — precedes language, and that the anticipatory, "overwriting" mode of prediction characterizing adult experience is largely a consequence of language rather than its foundation. The author argues this position is coherent and testable, distinguishing recognition from naming and tagging each claim by evidential status to indicate where it could be confirmed or refuted. |
Abstract
Abstract This paper sets out a framework, not a proof. It proposes that the usual order of explanation between consciousness and predictive processing may be reversed: that phenomenal consciousness — bare, non-linguistic awareness — precedes language, and that the specifically overwriting, anticipatory mode of prediction that colors adult experience is, in large part, a consequence of language rather than its foundation. The argument is built on a distinction between recognition (knowing without naming) and naming (labeling that lays prediction over perception). Around this core, the paper assembles what is established in the literature — predictive coding and the free-energy principle, default-mode-network dynamics in rumination and meditation, odour-evoked and non-declarative memory, cross-linguistic work on the name-ability of the senses, and epidemiology of cognitive decline — and separates it carefully from first-person report and from hypothesis. Each claim is tagged by evidential status. The aim is to show that a coherent, testable position can be stated without overclaiming, and to indicate where it could be confirmed or refuted.