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Published on: August 9, 2016
The compositionality continuum as a principle for studying the neural basis of intelligence
Reidar Riveland1, Alexandre Pouget2, Laura Driscoll3,4
1Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit, University College London, London, UK. r.riveland@ucl.ac.uk.
Nature Neuroscience
|August 5, 2026
Summary
Compositionality, key to intelligence, is not unique to humans. Research explores how both brains and AI achieve this ability through scale or explicit mechanisms.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Science
- Neuroscience
- Artificial Intelligence
Background:
- Compositionality, the ability to combine finite elements into infinite expressions, is traditionally seen as a human hallmark of intelligence.
- Recent findings challenge this, suggesting compositionality may not require explicit symbolic structures.
- Large language models (LLMs) and animal neural codes demonstrate compositional abilities through scale and neural mechanisms.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether compositionality is exclusive to human cognition.
- To explore the mechanisms underlying compositional abilities in biological brains and artificial systems.
- To determine if general intelligence necessitates explicit compositional structures or can arise from scaled computation.
Main Methods:
- Analyzing high-density neural recordings from animals performing compositional tasks.
- Reverse engineering neural network models to understand their compositional computations.
- Theorizing and modeling compositional mechanisms across biological and artificial systems.
Main Results:
- Compositional abilities are observed in non-human animals and large language models.
- Neural networks can exhibit compositional behavior without explicit symbolic structures.
- Compositionality may exist on a continuum of computational complexity.
Conclusions:
- Compositionality is not exclusively human and can emerge from scaled mechanisms.
- Understanding compositional mechanisms across systems is crucial for defining general intelligence.
- Future research should compare biological and artificial implementations to clarify the role of explicit compositionality.
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