The Brain as a Syntactic Engine Driving a Semantic Engine

idea of the brain as a syntactic engine it is important to see the difference between the number 1 and the symbol (in this case, a numeral or digit) `1'. Certainly, the difference between the city, Boston, and the word `Boston' is clear enough. The former has bad drivers in it; the latter has no people or cars at all, but does have six letters. No one would confuse a city with a word, but it is less obvious what the difference is between the number 1 and the numeral `1'. The point to keep in mind is that many different symbols, e.g., `II' (in Roman numerals), and `two' (in alphabetical writing) denote the same number, and one symbol, e.g., `10', can denote different numbers in different counting systems (as `10' denotes one number in binary and another in decimal).