I'm not sure I buy the premise that a brain even understands a literal sentence completely by simulating it, in all cases. I think that is a component of unders

I'm not sure I buy the premise that a brain even understands a literal sentence completely by simulating it, in all cases. I think that is a component of understanding, and can help understand, depending on both the sentence and our direct experience of the situation the sentence describes. But I don't think that is the whole story because I don't think that permits partial understanding. What explains our ability to understand (or partially) understand a sentence describing a novel situation we've never experienced involving objects or people we've never seen? As the article points out sometimes we are able to understand sentences for which there is no motor activity or visual experience associated. A huge example of this is soon after we're born and start to develop we begin to understand sentences even though we're not being formally taught a language - only exposed to it. The simulation theory seems not to explain that process of 'bootstrapping.'