ABSTRACT
As long ago as 1937, Sir Charles Sherrington was pointing out that the principle of “long-circuiting” through the “roof-brain” was central to the evolution of the human being and the human brain. In mammals sensory impulses get “long-circuited” to the “roof-brain” which then issues a “call” to lower-level reflex circuits to get them to respond. Literary theorists often take for granted a text’s “constraining” or “limiting” its reader, and surely most writers would like to think they have that kind of control. Physiological loops constitute the solid physical foundation on which reading with the eyes or understanding spoken language builds. Codes include things like rules for interpreting shapes as letters or numbers, the fixed rules of syntax, arithmetic, or algebra, or firmly established cultural codes like “Red means stop, green means go”.
