Bridging consciousness to our narrative brain: evolutionary insights
August 23, 2025 Antonio Benítez‐Burraco, Francesco Ferretti preprint
Human consciousness is often considered a form of inner speech, and humans possess exceptional narrative abilities that extend beyond language. This paper argues that evolutionary changes in the brain's narrative hardware, along with behavioral changes that culturally complexified language, improved the ability to tell stories to others and to oneself. This enhancement of inner storytelling may have sophisticated human consciousness. The authors suggest that improving generative story production could favor the emergence of consciousness in other entities, including artificial intelligence.