Semantics is the study of meaning as expressed through language, and it provides indirect access to an underlying level of conceptual structure. However, to what degree this conceptual structure is universal or is due to cultural histories, or to the environment inhabited by a speech community, is still controversial. Meaning is notoriously difficult to measure, let alone parameterise, for quantitative comparative studies.

How a complex dynamic network such as the human brain gives rise to consciousness has yet to be established by science. A popular view among many neuroscientists is that, through a variety of learning paradigms, the brain builds relationships and in the context of these relationships a brain state acquires meaning in the form of the relational content of the corresponding experience.