Speech recognition and sensory integration: a 240-year-old theorem helps explain how people and machines can integrate auditory and visual information to understand speech

The capacity of the brain to combine sensory information has perplexed scientists who have spent valuable research time trying to understand how people integrate sensory information in speech perception. In some cases, the human nervous system learns to represent the signals as independent prior to sensory integration. Since learning is imperative to achieving expert pattern integration, it is easier for a system to learn the appropriate contingencies.