The “First Language” of Rhythmic and Geometric Brain Patterns
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April 21, 2025
Introduction
Human language is typically thought of as spoken or written symbols, but some theorists propose a deeper “first language” rooted in the brain’s own rhythmic and geometric patterns of activity. Before words ever evolved, early humans (and even pre-human brains) might have communicated or thought using neuro-sensory patterns – internal experiences of pulsating rhythms and visual geometries.
For example, the flicker of firelight or the pulsation of a drum could entrain neural rhythms, while closed-eye visions of swirling shapes or grids might have served as primitive proto-symbols. This report explores how temporal patterns (changes over time, like rhythmic flickers) and spatial patterns (organized shapes in neural activity) could have functioned as a primal form of internal experience or communication.
We draw on neuroscience (e.g. temporal coding and cortical pattern formation), cognitive science (embodied cognition, qualia, internal representations), and anthropology/philosophy (sacred geometry, early symbols, archetypal imagery) to examine whether such temporo-spatial experiences acted as structured communication or cognitive symbols – a kind of “first language” underlying spoken language.
Neuroscience Perspective: Temporal Coding and Brain Rhythms
One cornerstone of this idea is the concept of temporal coding in the brain. Unlike a simple rate code (where only the frequency of neural firing matters), temporal coding means that the precise timing of neural spikes carries information.
Neurons can fire in specific patterns – for instance, locked to an external rhythm or oscillation – and these time-patterns can encode distinct messages. Neuroscientists have found that the brain is rife with oscillatory rhythms (waves of neural activity at various frequencies) which provide a kind of timing backbone for neural communication.
These oscillations create alternating windows of high and low excitability, effectively “chunking” neural signals into packets (sometimes called cell assemblies) and chaining those packets into sequences.
In other words, brain rhythms may impose a syntax on neural activity, much like grammar structures a sentence. This has led researchers like György Buzsáki to describe brain oscillations as a “neural syntax” that organizes thoughts by coordinating when neurons fire.
Crucially, rhythmic brain activity isn’t just background noise – it correlates with specific cognitive contents. For example, gamma oscillations in visual cortex can selectively represent an attended stimulus (faster oscillations for what we focus on vs. slower for background).
By synchronizing in rhythm, separate groups of neurons can effectively communicate, a principle termed “communication through coherence” in neuroscience.
Temporal patterns thereby serve as a primitive neural code: the brain can use time as a channel for information, encoding meaning in synchronous bursts, phase delays, or frequency changes of neural firing.
In a sense, these rhythmic codes are an internal communication system – one that predates any external language. Even external rhythmic stimulation can tap into this system; for instance, rhythmic flickering visuals can entrain brain oscillations and even enhance cognitive performance in other domains, suggesting that our brains naturally parse and respond to temporal patterns.
Neuroscience Perspective: Spatial Patterns and Cortical Geometry
Complementing the time-based code is a spatial code of brain activity patterns. The cerebral cortex is organized in maps and columns that can produce structured activation patterns – think of them as the brain’s innate geometric language.
Under certain conditions, humans experience vivid geometric hallucinations: seeing forms like grids, spirals, or webs that are not present in reality. Remarkably, such patterns occur across many cultures and brain states.
Anthropologists note that nearly all human cultures describe seeing similar geometric visions, and indeed painted these patterns on cave walls tens of thousands of years ago. These visions can be triggered in many ways – as people fall asleep or wake up, during sensory deprivation, in near-death experiences, or under the influence of psychedelic substances.
Even simple sensory rhythms like bright flickering light can induce these patterns in our visual field. The 19th-century scientist Jan Purkinje, for example, found that looking at sunlight through a fast spinning wheel produced swirling shapes and checkerboards behind closed eyes.
Crucially, such imagery is internally generated: observers report seeing them “with both eyes” (not tied to one eye’s input) and stable in the visual field, implying the patterns arise from the brain’s own activity. Modern research localizes their origin to the primary visual cortex (V1), since even imagining fine details (with eyes closed) activates V1 in a similar way.
Figure: Common Geometric Patterns (“Form Constants”)
Common geometric patterns (“form constants”) observed in human vision during altered states. Psychologist Heinrich Klüver noted four frequent categories: tunnels or funnels (radial striped patterns, top-left), spirals (top-right), honeycomb lattices or gratings (bottom-left), and cobwebs (web-like nets, bottom-right).
These recurring visuals contain repeating geometric structures and appear in hallucinations induced by drugs, flickering light, or trance states. Notably, archaeologists have identified similar grids, spirals, and radial patterns in Upper Paleolithic cave art, suggesting that early humans externalized these inner visions as markings.
Neuroscientists propose that the architecture of cortical networks gives rise to these form-constant patterns. The cortex has a retinotopic mapping (a warped “map” of the visual field laid onto V1) and long-range lateral connections that can spread activity in waves.
According to computational models, when the visual cortex is diffusely excited (by chemicals or flicker), it can fall into self-organized states – a bit like a drumhead vibrating into specific modes. These states manifest as the striped or grid-like patterns we perceive.
In a landmark theory, Bressloff and Cowan showed that symmetries in cortical connectivity explain why we see exactly those four categories of hallucinations. The brain, in effect, has built-in geometric templates.
Thus, long before written symbols like circles or grids appeared in culture, the visual brain was already “writing” such shapes in neural activity. This internal repertoire of shapes could serve as a proto-alphabet of thought – fundamental images that carry meaning or significance to the brain.
Cognitive Science Perspective: Embodied Experience and Qualia
From a cognitive standpoint, these rhythmic and geometric patterns can be seen as embodied mental representations, perhaps constituting the building blocks of thought.
Embodied cognition theory holds that our mind and concepts arise from bodily and sensory interactions with the world. Long before we learn words, our brains are mapping experiences: the rocking of walking, the heartbeat’s pulse, the alternating day-night light – all are rhythms that shape cognition.
Likewise, seeing edges and shapes as an infant trains the brain’s visual system to recognize basic forms. These sensorimotor patterns may become internal “rehearsals” of meaning.
In fact, proponents of embodied cognition argue that even abstract ideas are grounded in such bodily patterns; the physical body and its perceptual patterns “constitute or contribute to cognition” at a fundamental level.
We can think of a newborn’s mind as immersed in a sea of raw temporo-spatial experiences (fluctuating lights, sounds, touch rhythms) – a kind of primal sensory language from which more abstract thought will later emerge.
Another relevant concept is that of qualia, the subjective qualities of experience (the “redness” of red, the feeling of a rhythm, etc.). Neuroscience models suggest that qualia might correspond to information encoded in specific neural patterns.
In an information-based theory, “information structures” in the brain – essentially the physical pattern of action potentials across neurons – carry “information messages,” which are the interpreted meaning of those patterns and the basis of conscious experience.
In simpler terms, whenever neurons fire in a certain spatiotemporal pattern, the brain itself reads that as a particular sensation or image.
For example, an input pattern of firing in a visual network might be identified by the brain as a shape (say, “circle”), and the network’s output then creates a representation of that shape internally.
Through reentrant loops and feedback, the brain can even refine these patterns, leading to stable attractor states that we experience as a steady image or thought.
What this means for a “first language” is that the brain’s internal code of patterns = internal symbols. Long before we attach the word “circle” to a shape, the experience of a round form is already a mental symbol represented by a specific neural firing configuration.
Similarly, a rhythm felt (like a lullaby beat) is an internal symbol represented by a temporal firing pattern, perhaps in auditory and motor cortex.
These internal representations – geometric qualia and rhythmic qualia – could be thought of as a pre-verbal vocabulary shared by all humans (and perhaps many animals).
They are embodied (arising from real physical interactions) and also symbolic in that they stand for things (a certain pattern is the experience of, say, “tunnel vision” or “heartbeat”).
Thus, the brain’s language is one of temporal sequences and spatial maps, forming the substrate of thought upon which later true language (with arbitrary words) is built.
Anthropological and Philosophical Perspectives
Looking at human culture and philosophy, we find intriguing echoes of this neuro-sensory “first language.” Many ancient traditions revere geometric patterns and rhythms as sacred or fundamental.
The term “sacred geometry” refers to the idea that certain shapes and patterns are cosmic truths, appearing throughout nature and consciousness.
For example, circular mandalas and spiral motifs occur independently in distant civilizations, often as symbols of wholeness or journey. Could it be that these shapes are universally meaningful because our brains already know them?
Anthropologists have noted that the same geometric signs – dots, zigzags, grids, spirals – appear in prehistoric cave art across the world. Paleoanthropologist Genevieve von Petzinger documented 32 distinct symbols recurring in Ice Age European caves over 30,000 years, such as cross-hatches, hand-like curves, and circles.
She argues these markings were “meant to transmit information”, potentially an early system of graphic communication – a proto-writing or symbolic code.
It’s remarkable that many of these symbols (##, ●, ▲, etc.) correspond to the very forms seen in entoptic hallucinations. This has led researchers to speculate that early humans externalized inner neural patterns as art, using them to communicate shared experiences or for ritual purposes.
In a dark cave lit by flickering torches, our ancestors might literally have seen the walls come alive with the same patterns their brains generated, inspiring them to paint those patterns as part of a communal understanding.
Rhythmic patterns were likely just as important. Before spoken language, communication and social bonding in hunter-gatherer groups relied on music, dance, and rhythm.
Anthropological evidence suggests that rhythmic drumming, clapping, or chanting are nearly universal in traditional cultures, often to induce trance or unity.
A steady drumbeat at ~4 beats per second, for instance, can synchronize people’s brainwaves in the theta range and facilitate a shared trance state. Such entrainment means multiple brains literally oscillate together, possibly leading to shared mental imagery or emotion – a form of group communication through rhythm.
While hard to find direct fossil evidence of drumming, the oldest known musical instruments (flutes, etc.) date to at least 40,000 years ago, implying rhythmic music was present at the dawn of modern humans.
In effect, a ritual dance with drums and fire could have been an early “broadcast” on the first language: everyone’s brains keyed into the same beat (temporal code) and perhaps experiencing similar phosphenes or visions (spatial code) in the flicker of the fire.
From a philosophical angle, Carl Jung’s concept of archetypal imagery resonates with this idea of an innate symbolic pattern-language.
Jung proposed that the collective unconscious of humanity is structured by archetypes – primordial images and patterns (the mother, the hero, the mandala, etc.) – that recur in dreams and myths across cultures.
Modern interpretations of Jung by neuroscientists suggest these archetypal patterns might arise from common structures in our brains.
For example, Jung was fascinated by mandalas (circular, symmetric drawings) that patients would create in therapy, intuitively using geometry to express the “Self.”
Today, researchers note that “archetypal imagery emergent in altered states such as psychedelic experiences” aligns with certain brain network dynamics.
A recent neuroscientific study described these archetypal patterns as “eigenmodes of the deep unconscious,” essentially natural resonant modes of brain activity that produce the same symbolic forms in different people.
This implies that when people through history reported visions of a world tree, a sacred circle, or a lattice that holds the world together, they may have been tapping into the brain’s built-in first language of geometric-rhythmic representations.
The collective unconscious could simply be the common neurological heritage of Homo sapiens – our shared neural architecture gives rise to similar foundational experiences (the first language), which we then encode in stories and art.
Temporo-Spatial Patterns as a Proto-Language
Bringing these perspectives together, we can sketch how temporo-spatial brain patterns might have functioned as a proto-language – a structured system of internal symbols predating words.
In this view, the “words” of this language were rhythmic oscillations and visual motifs, and the “grammar” was provided by how the brain could combine and transition between patterns.
A simple example: an increase in neural rhythm frequency might signify heightened alertness or significance (a bit like an exclamation), while a specific shape (say a looming tunnel) might signify entering a different mental state.
Before linguistic narratives, an early human’s internal dialog may have consisted of sequences of sensations and mental images: “bright flicker – expanding spiral – fast heartbeat” could be an embodied way of realizing danger, for instance, long before the word “fear” existed.
These neural patterns were likely both experiential and communicative. They were experiential in that they constituted the person’s subjective reality (their qualia), but they could become communicative if shared or signaled.
Early hominins might have intentionally induced certain patterns in themselves or others as a form of message.
Consider the controlled use of firelight in a cave: by rhythmically blocking and unblocking a fire (creating a flicker), one could induce particular sensations in observers – perhaps a primitive performance art meant to convey something (a ritual trance or a story).
Likewise, rhythmic sound (clapping, stamping) could modulate listeners’ brain rhythms and emotional states, “speaking” to them in the language of the body.
Over time, humans externalized more of these internal codes: mark-making (drawing patterns) was a way to make a transient hallucination permanent and sharable, and ritual dance was a way to align an entire group’s inner rhythms.
In this sense, temporo-spatial experiences acted as structured communication – not yet words, but signs and signals that had shared meaning within a culture.
An important implication is that human cognitive symbols may originate from these brain-based patterns.
The earliest abstract symbols in archaeology are geometric (lines, circles, cross-hatches), not arbitrary figures. This suggests a continuity between neurobiological patterns and the birth of symbolism.
Over millennia, as humans developed spoken language, this first language did not vanish – it likely shaped the way spoken language evolved.
Linguists have noted that many basic words and metaphors in languages relate to spatial and bodily concepts (e.g. “up/down” for mood, “close/distant” for relationships), hinting that sensorimotor schemas underlie language structure.
Those schemas are effectively the legacy of the first language: our brains think in patterns, and we map words onto those pre-existing mental patterns.
Conclusion and Implications
The notion of a pre-linguistic “first language” of rhythmic and geometric neural patterns is a powerful interdisciplinary idea.
It suggests that the roots of human communication and thought run far deeper than speech, down into the very dynamics of neurons and perception.
By this account, anyone with a brain is already fluent in this language from birth – we all know the “feel” of a rhythm or the “meaning” of a shape intuitively.
This has intriguing implications. It bridges biology and culture, explaining why certain symbols and rituals appear universally: they resonate with our shared neural patterns.
It offers a new perspective on qualia and consciousness – perhaps our private inner experiences are the brain’s way of talking to itself in this symbolic code, creating a continuous internal narrative of patterns.
It also might inform the origin of language: spoken language could have piggybacked on neural pattern recognition, assigning sounds to concepts that were already distinguished by the brain’s internal code.
Scientifically, exploring this proto-language means studying how neural oscillations and activity patterns represent information (the so-called neural code) and how those internal representations can be influenced or read.
Advances in neuroimaging and brain-machine interfaces are, in a way, attempting to decode the brain’s first language by correlating patterns of brain activity with thoughts or sensations.
Understanding this could lead to novel ways of communication – for instance, devices that communicate directly through patterns of light or sound to synchronize brain states, invoking feelings or images without words.
It also deepens our appreciation of ancient human art and ritual: those may not be primitive at all, but rather deliberate expressions in an older, deeply human mode of communication.
In Summary
The idea of a temporo-spatial “first language” posits that rhythmic pulses and geometric forms were humanity’s first semantic canvas, an intrinsic messaging system of the brain that set the stage for all later forms of language and symbolism.
This hypothesis knits together neuroscience, cognitive science, and anthropology into a coherent story: the sacred dance of neuronal patterns became the dance of culture.
While much remains theoretical, the evidence of common neural patterns, universal symbols, and shared experiential archetypes gives credence to the notion that, long before we spoke, we saw and felt in unison – and that was our first language.
References (Scientific Supporting Sources)
- Buzsáki, G. (2012). Brain Rhythms and Neural Syntax. Neuron, 76(5), 984-990. (Discusses how brain oscillations chunk information into sequences, creating a syntax-like structure).
- Bressloff, P. C., et al. (2002). What Geometric Visual Hallucinations Tell Us about the Visual Cortex. Neural Computation, 14(3), 473–491. (Shows that common hallucination patterns – tunnels, spirals, lattices, cobwebs – arise from V1 cortical circuitry).
- Orpwood, R. (2017). Information and the Origin of Qualia. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience, 11:22. (Proposes that neural firing patterns (information structures) are interpreted by cortical networks as information messages, forming the basis of qualia).
- von Petzinger, G. (2016). The First Signs: Unlocking the Mysteries of the World’s Oldest Symbols. (Paleoanthropological survey showing Ice Age Europeans used 32 recurring geometric symbols, likely to convey information).
- McGovern, H. T., et al. (2024). Eigenmodes of the Deep Unconscious: The neuropsychology of Jungian archetypes and psychedelic experience. (Preprint; interprets Jungian archetypal images as patterns emergent from brain network dynamics, especially in altered states).
(Additional citations embedded in text above from various sources have been provided to support specific points.)