Representation

Recent articles

Aran Nayebi discusses a NeuroAI update to the Turing test

And he highlights the need to match neural representations across machines and organisms to build better autonomous agents.

By Paul Middlebrooks
9 April 2025 | 104 min listen
Photograph of a child sitting at a laptop and performing an executive function test.

Brain imaging at the fair with Ka Ip

Does environment affect how children from diverse backgrounds perform on tests of executive function? Ip went to the Minnesota State Fair to find out.

By Angie Voyles Askham
24 September 2024 | 9 min read
Illustration of a frog in front of a composite of images of flora and fauna in the frog’s surroundings.

When do neural representations give rise to mental representations?

To answer this question, consider the animal’s umwelt, or what it needs to know about the world.

By Kevin Mitchell
13 February 2024 | 7 min read
A hand points to an illustration on a chalkboard.

From a scientist’s perspective: The Transmitter’s top five essays in 2023

From big-picture debates about theories and terms to practical tips for teaching and writing, our favorite expert-written articles offer a glimpse into what neuroscientists are thinking.

By The Transmitter
25 December 2023 | 3 min read
A duck on the water in profile, with its beak facing upwards, looks like a rabbit.

Mistaking a duck for a skvader: How a conceptual form of circular analysis may taint many neuroscience studies

These logical loops are harder to spot than circularity involving noise in the data, but they result from neglecting something closer to home: existing knowledge about the brain.

By Bahar Gholipour
22 December 2023 | 7 min read
An abstract illustration of a figure from the shoulders up with multi-colored boxes on its face

What ‘drifting representations’ reveal about the brain

How neuronal activity patterns associated with a behavior can change, even when the behavior does not — something once seen as an experimental artifact — could offer new insights about neural function.

By Angie Voyles Askham
13 December 2023 | 8 min read
Illustration of a scientist looking a grid of four pictures; each picture gets blurrier proceeding from left to right.

What are we talking about? Clarifying the fuzzy concept of representation in neuroscience and beyond

To foster discourse, scientists need to account for all the different ways they use the term “representation.”

By Francis T. Fallon, Tomás J. Ryan, John W. Krakauer, The RPPF group
13 November 2023 | 6 min read

Explore more from The Transmitter

Research image of fMRI scans showing decision-making across individuals.

During decision-making, brain shows multiple distinct subtypes of activity

Person-to-person variability in brain activity might represent meaningful differences in cognitive processes, rather than random noise.

By Claudia López Lloreda
18 April 2025 | 5 min read
Tic-tac-toe board with pills representing x’s and o’s.

Basic pain research ‘is not working’: Q&A with Steven Prescott and Stéphanie Ratté

Prescott and Ratté critique the clinical relevance of preclinical studies in the field and highlight areas for improvement.

By Sydney Wyatt
18 April 2025 | 7 min read
National Institutes of Health building cleaved in two.

Proposed NIH budget cut threatens ‘massive destruction of American science’

A leaked draft of a Trump administration proposal includes an approximately 40 percent cut to the National Institutes of Health’s budget and a major reorganization of its 27 institutes and centers.

By Angie Voyles Askham
17 April 2025 | 3 min read