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It seems that what the brain picks up and focuses on in our environment, like the sound of a book falling on the floor or in making sense of all the noise at an amusement park, is determined by culturally induced meanings.  If someone from the first century was teleported into our world it seems that they would be bewildered and would most likely not be able to process the world in the same way that we do.  They wouldn’t see many things that we see and they wouldn’t recognize many of the things that they. This wouldn’t be due to problems with their brain, their cells, their neurons or their biochemistry.  They would be functioning like those of any homo sapien.  Their difficulty at interpreting their new reality would come from having a different  world view, values, cultural expectations, and interpretations.  They would not have developed the the cultural framework that allows for the selection and interpretation of meaning.  Do these cultural interpretations and values direct and influence these biochemical and neurological processes?  Would someone who experienced something differently due to significant cultural variation have the same physical and biochemical reactions?