# Are Words the Quanta of Human Language? Extending the Domain of Quantum Cognition arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2110.04913 ยท HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2110.04913/ ## Key facts - Cited by 7 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026). - Builds on 20 of its 129 references that are in the map. - First posted on arXiv 10 Oct 2021. ## Builds on (most cited first, 20 of 20) - [Quantum Structure in Cognition: Human Language as a Boson Gas of Entangled Words](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1909.06845/) (2019) - [Quantum Entanglement in Concept Combinations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1302.3831/) (2013) - [Towards a Quantum World Wide Web](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.06642/) (2017) - [The Heart of an Image: Quantum Superposition and Entanglement in Visual Perception](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.02216/) (2018) - [Quantum entanglement in physical and cognitive systems: a conceptual analysis and a general representation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.09103/) (2019) - [The Quantum Nature of Identity in Human Thought: Bose-Einstein Statistics for Conceptual Indistinguishability](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1410.6854/) (2014) - [On the Foundations of the Brussels Operational-Realistic Approach to Cognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.08710/) (2015) - [Spin and Wind Directions II: A Bell State Quantum Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.01188/) (2017) - [Entanglement in Cognition violating Bell Inequalities Beyond Cirel'son's Bound](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2102.03847/) (2021) - [Quantum Bose-Einstein Statistics for Indistinguishable Concepts in Human Language](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.15125/) (2021) - [A New Fundamental Evidence of Non-Classical Structure in the Combination of Natural Concepts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1505.04981/) (2015) - [Spin and Wind Directions I: Identifying Entanglement in Nature and Cognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1508.00434/) (2015) - [Toward a Quantum Theory of Humor](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.04647/) (2017) - [Quantum Entanglement in Corpuses of Documents](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1810.12114/) (2018) - [Quantum-theoretic Modeling in Computer Science A complex Hilbert space model for entangled concepts in corpuses of documents](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1901.04299/) (2019) - [Explaining versus Describing Human Decisions. Hilbert Space Structures in Decision Theory](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.02523/) (2019) - [Quantum Structure of Negation and Conjunction in Human Thought](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1503.04260/) (2015) - [Testing Quantum Models of Conjunction Fallacy on the World Wide Web](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1609.07721/) (2016) - [Conjunction and Negation of Natural Concepts: A Quantum-theoretic Modeling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1406.2358/) (2014) - [Measuring Conceptual Entanglement in Collections of Documents](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1909.09708/) (2019) ## Built on by (most cited first, 7 of 7) - [A Planck Radiation and Quantization Scheme for Human Cognition and Language](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.03306/) (2022) - [Human Perception as a Phenomenon of Quantization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2208.03726/) (2022) - [Identifying Quantum Structure in AI Language: Evidence for Evolutionary Convergence of Human and Artificial Cognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.21731/) (2025) - [Development of a Thermodynamics of Human Cognition and Human Culture](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.12795/) (2022) - [Entanglement as a Method to Reduce Uncertainty](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.05898/) (2023) - [Identifying Quantum Mechanical Statistics in Italian Corpora](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.07919/) (2024) - [Are Colors Quanta of Light for Human Vision? A Quantum Cognition Study of Visual Perception](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.18850/) (2024) ## Abstract (arXiv) In previous research, we showed that 'texts that tell a story' exhibit a statistical structure that is not Maxwell-Boltzmann but Bose-Einstein. Our explanation is that this is due to the presence of 'indistinguishability' in human language as a result of the same words in different parts of the story being indistinguishable from one another. In the current article, we set out to provide an explanation for this Bose-Einstein statistics. We show that it is the presence of 'meaning' in 'stories' that gives rise to the lack of independence characteristic of Bose-Einstein, and provides conclusive evidence that 'words can be considered the quanta of human language', structurally similar to how 'photons are the quanta of light'. Using several studies on entanglement from our Brussels research group, we also show that it is also the presence of 'meaning' in texts that makes the von Neumann entropy of a total text smaller relative to the entropy of the words composing it. We explain how the new insights in this article fit in with the research domain called 'quantum cognition', where quantum probability models and quantum vector spaces are used in human cognition, and are also relevant to the use of quantum structures in information retrieval and natural language processing, and how they introduce 'quantization' and 'Bose-Einstein statistics' as relevant quantum effects there. Inspired by the conceptuality interpretation of quantum mechanics, and relying on the new insights, we put forward hypotheses about the nature of physical reality. In doing so, we note how this new type of decrease in entropy, and its explanation, may be important for the development of quantum thermodynamics. We likewise note how it can also give rise to an original explanatory picture of the nature of physical reality on the surface of planet Earth, in which human culture emerges as a reinforcing continuation of life.