tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post1712783203000032734..comments2024-03-28T04:04:55.806-07:00Comments on Faculty of Language: Parameters, anyone?Norberthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701059232144474269noreply@blogger.comBlogger28125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-743877339462247632013-01-29T13:48:15.006-08:002013-01-29T13:48:15.006-08:00Just a quick plug for my combinatorial variability...Just a quick plug for my combinatorial variability model for dealing with sociolinguistic variables and their probabilistic distribution. It's surely not right as is, but it does at least attempt to tackle your question. Adger and Smith 2005 and Adger 2006, et seq (on lingbuzz).davidadgerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00821774928618824698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-49681222802256288542013-01-28T03:46:59.167-08:002013-01-28T03:46:59.167-08:00Why not analogize to bilateral symmetry? Some vari...Why not analogize to bilateral symmetry? Some variation, but not enough to change the basic facts. Is it required for survival or a basic feature of the biophysics. Just a thought.Norberthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15701059232144474269noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-46003755015293946522013-01-28T02:03:42.700-08:002013-01-28T02:03:42.700-08:00You say: "Wouldn't we have to know a lot ...You say: "Wouldn't we have to know a lot more about the underlying biology to make predictions like that? I don't think armchair guesstimates of the expected levels of variation are worth anything."<br /><br />I could not agree more. But note my armchair guesstimates are just as good [or bad] as yours. What IS known about the underlying biology, about the genetic variation that does not account for much if any linguistic variation? Chomsky's entire biolinguistics is at this point based on armchair guesstimates. Maybe his guesstimates are good but without confirmation from biological/genetic research we really can't tell. <br /><br />I think we have been talking past each other [and probably will continue to do so, so we should just agree to disagree] because we focus on different aspects of evolution: I on the potential to produce change over time [e.g. from one celled organisms to humans...] you on the potential to preserve structure over time [e.g. the human spine now vs. 100,000 years ago]. Both are of course part of evolution and without knowing what the actual structures of the LF are it is pointless to debate which force is stronger in this case. <br /><br />I think armchair speculation has its place to challenge one's assumption, to motivate oneself to look for alternatives. But when it is used as [only] evidence for one's hypothesis it becomes a problem. And I am glad that we seem to agree on that last point.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-46009027889004116482013-01-27T14:21:13.010-08:002013-01-27T14:21:13.010-08:00I'm a bit lost here Christina. Do we have some...I'm a bit lost here Christina. Do we have some strong reason to think that there isn't minor genetically-determined individual variation in ILs? Suppose that such variation did exist. Then we'd expect to find differences between the ILs of different individuals growing up in the same speech communities. That is, to all appearances, what we do in fact find! So where's the problem? I personally doubt that genetic variation accounts for much if any linguistic variation (pathological cases aside), but the available evidence is nonetheless perfectly consistent with the hypothesis that it does.<br /><br /><i>So we should expect huge variety by now</i><br /><br />Wouldn't we have to know a lot more about the underlying biology to make predictions like that? I don't think armchair guesstimates of the expected levels of variation are worth anything.Alex Drummondhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04676457657606185543noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-48100813411417161802013-01-27T13:54:09.234-08:002013-01-27T13:54:09.234-08:00But this is the problem, isn't it? According t...But this is the problem, isn't it? According to Chomsky 'every child unerringly knows X' [X stands for ANY and EVERY structure that could not have been learned from the evidence] - so it won't do to have variation here or you do not have EVERY child UNERRINGLY knowing X - if there is variation then at least some children don't know X. Further if you allow for small variation, then you have to accept that over many generations small variation can add up to huge variation. And by definition you have no input that could 'correct' for this - so over generations the innate component would change along different trajectories in different individuals and we would no longer understand each other. [again i assume here that Chomsky is right and the function of language is expression of my thought, not communicating with you].<br /><br />Your analogy to hearts is not very helpful. There is a fairly narrow range of possible variation, if the heart exceeds those it's owner can't survive and won't pass the variation on to the next generation. But no one dies because she has a slightly different language faculty. So we should expect huge variety by now for exactly the things that can not possibly be learned from the input...Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-18415820098941923512013-01-27T13:12:23.201-08:002013-01-27T13:12:23.201-08:00What Alex Drummond said was implicit in my last co...What Alex Drummond said was implicit in my last comment (or it was my intention at least). See twin studies in the Neil Smith's post (Parametric Variation and Darwin’s Problem). <br /><br />Correction: "it has to "learn" how to respond "VilemKodytekhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13161547663393188912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-59690989821802525182013-01-27T12:48:31.052-08:002013-01-27T12:48:31.052-08:00Christina: But surely in a biological organ as th...Christina: <i> But surely in a biological organ as the language faculty is, we ought to expect some variation, especially for traits that have little or no effect on survival [take eye-colour]. So how can we explain that for IL there is NO variation whatsoever? </i><br /><br />Why do you think that there is no variation? I wouldn't take that to be an explanandum in the first place. Certainly, various kinds of language disorders suggest that some people have ILs which don't work normally. Beyond that, there may well be small variations between individuals which don't have a very great effect on language acquisition. In the same way, there is individual variation between hearts, but leaving aside people with heart disorders, they all work pretty much the same (to the extent that students in a biology class can learn about how "the heart" works, abstracting away from individual variation).Alex Drummondhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04676457657606185543noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-45086434119372045512013-01-27T11:37:54.801-08:002013-01-27T11:37:54.801-08:00That all depends on the particular POS argument. I...That all depends on the particular POS argument. I agree that the subject/aux inversion example does not argue strongly for a specifically linguistic nativism, but as you know, that's just a trivial example that Chomsky used to illustrate how a POS argument works. If the piece of knowledge acquired is, say, the Weak Crossover constraint, then it's quite a bit less plausible to maintain that the child's acquisition of the correct rule is due to a non-language-specific learning bias. Minimalism, to the extent that it's been successful, has somewhat undermined this line of argument: the principles of GB theory were just too bizarre and idiosyncratic for anyone to take them to follow from general cognitive principles. In any case, I for one am happy to settle for non-linguistic nativism if that is where the chips fall. (I don't think that's where they will fall, but we'll have to wait and see.)Alex Drummondhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04676457657606185543noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-72567568592925252402013-01-27T07:38:22.450-08:002013-01-27T07:38:22.450-08:00OK, I misunderstood your point.
We have to learn...OK, I misunderstood your point. <br /><br />We have to learn walking, but nevertheless walking capacity is innate and it doesn't matter whether one's legs are shorter/longer, weaker/stronger etc. than the average. The immune system is innate, yet it have to "learn" how to respond to, say, the pig flu virus. And, moreover, what it has learned depends on the "input". Why should language be any different?VilemKodytekhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13161547663393188912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-43321877922260727082013-01-27T07:29:36.653-08:002013-01-27T07:29:36.653-08:00There's no a priori reason why passing on IL s...There's no a priori reason why passing on IL should be like eye-color in that it differs between individuals. The analogy to eye-color was strictly to explain how something that's not directly selected-for can be a side-effect of something that IS selected-for.<br /><br />[edited for spelling]Darryl McAdamshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17446496860034614969noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-6551197222489689732013-01-27T07:28:20.512-08:002013-01-27T07:28:20.512-08:00This comment has been removed by the author.Darryl McAdamshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17446496860034614969noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-85495447347444369572013-01-27T06:28:32.106-08:002013-01-27T06:28:32.106-08:00First, IL is by my definition the stuff we could n...First, IL is by my definition the stuff we could not have learned [Impossible to have been Learned] but nevertheless know. So it is not a 'negative definition' and nothing dogs have but stuff we allegedly all know and all share [that what makes the POSA persuasive]. <br />Second if passing on IL is like eye colour then it would differ between individuals by now, just as eye colour does. But in that case it no longer explains what it was supposed to explain: why we all know the stuff we have allegedly no input for and all end up with the same Grammar [I language or whatever your most current terminology is] for English . Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-23033778069824685162013-01-27T05:13:09.928-08:002013-01-27T05:13:09.928-08:00You're confuse cause and effect. The effects o...You're confuse cause and effect. The effects of FLN (your IL) may not be evolutionarily advantageous, but FLN itself could well be. That is to say, the effect of, say, parasitic gaps, or the coordinate structure constraint, could easily just be a side-effect of some other thing, just like eye-color was never selected-for but certainly melanin itself was.Darryl McAdamshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17446496860034614969noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-56744503159172135542013-01-27T02:35:37.192-08:002013-01-27T02:35:37.192-08:00I take your IL is no more than a kind of negative ...I take your IL is no more than a kind of negative definition of possible human grammars. We know pretty well how it works, for example, in chimps or dogs. Maybe some extraterrestrial creatures would easily identify our own. You are saying: “So some neural structures must contain all this 'stuff that could not possibly be learned' for all human languages. These structures must have evolved and remained constant for some 50,000 to 100,000 years in every human.” Pls let me know which neural structures in dogs contain their IL? Probably those that are not present or developed enough in them. <br /><br />If you want to think about things that have some survival value, you’d better have in mind language or expressing thoughts rather than a sentence. The point is that children get it not what value it has.VilemKodytekhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13161547663393188912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-48553668852610859682013-01-27T00:51:29.392-08:002013-01-27T00:51:29.392-08:00Each time I come across the kind of arguments for ...Each time I come across the kind of arguments for nativism [AN} you use here, e.g., " the central line of argument was ... that people could be shown to know stuff that they couldn't possibly have learned" they seem just so wrong to me, that i think i must miss something really important. So maybe you can help me out here and explain what that is? I see 2 problems with the AN:<br /><br />1. Lets assume nativism is true, then it should be the case that for English we have some stuff people could have learned [L] and some stuff people could not have leaned [IL]. IL then is 'innate'. IL is of course the same for every speaker of English while L differs depending on your input. But surely in a biological organ as the language faculty is, we ought to expect some variation, especially for traits that have little or no effect on survival [take eye-colour]. So how can we explain that for IL there is NO variation whatsoever? As you say the persuasiveness of the argument for nativism is that it accounts for what seemingly could not have learned from input. As Chomsky pointed out early on some of the relevant constructions are such that a speaker could go through her entire life without encountering them - so they hardly can have much survival value... <br /><br />2. Assume we know the difference between L and IL for English. We really have only solved a tiny sub-problem. We also need to figure it out for German, Hungarian, Japanese, Piraha, and all the 6000+ languages currently spoken [+ languages that no longer are spoken and languages that might be spoken in the future]. Given that all languages have some IL and your infant could learn all of them if exposed to relevant input it seems to follow IL for every human language must be innate. So it must be in every human brain. Now no matter how much I disagree with Chomsky on other things i believe he is certainly right to say that at one point the theories we develop about nativism "have to be translated into some terms that are neurologically realizable" [Chomsky, 2012, p. 91]. So some neural structures must contain all this 'stuff that could not possibly be learned' for all human languages. These structures must have evolved and remained constant for some 50,000 to 100,000 years in every human. <br />I'd be grateful for any suggestions re how to deal with 1. and 2.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-87904828068306405402013-01-27T00:49:03.483-08:002013-01-27T00:49:03.483-08:00Yes AD; "Any given POS argument stands or fal...Yes AD; "Any given POS argument stands or falls entirely independently of the success of a P&P acquisition model, so the arguments for nativism based on the POS are not tied to P&P." That is quite correct.<br /><br />POS arguments are arguments ultimately <b>against</b> empiricist learning algorithms rather than <b>for</b> nativist learners. So you could refute them by showing that there are empiricist learners, but not by showing that specific nativist learners fail.<br /><br />But nativism in this context is linguistic nativism and it is not enough to show that there is some bias but that there is some linguistically specific bias. And a general bias that rules out a linear rule (by e.g. not considering movement rules at all) need not be linguistically specific. So at best the POS arguments are arguments in favour of general nativism (which is uncontroversial) and not in favour of Chomskyan linguistic nativism. <br />Alex Clarkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04634767958690153584noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-56076718736436644102013-01-26T23:54:03.339-08:002013-01-26T23:54:03.339-08:00Yes, I had forgotten about the Kwiatkowski-Steedma...Yes, I had forgotten about the Kwiatkowski-Steedman learner. Which seems to me to work because of the inherent restrictiveness of CCG. It also learns to parse using probabilities, but not to produce, I think I remember.AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-60266496700553942352013-01-26T20:49:56.679-08:002013-01-26T20:49:56.679-08:00I think it'd be really useful to try and get s...I think it'd be really useful to try and get some categorialists in on this discussion. To the best of my knowledge, the closest thing to parameters in the categorial domain is Steedman's language-specific availability of different combinatorial operations.<br /><br />I think there's also some possible insight into the substance of a parameter-less theory from the categorial perspective in general. One could imagine that the space of all possible syntactic combinators has some sort of complexity metric defined over it (something like how specific the types of the premises are, or how asymmetric they are, or whatever), and that the LAD searches this space in order of complexity, trying out simpler combinators before more complex combinators. Then you wouldn't have any sort of parameters in the usual sense at all, you just have all logically possible combinatorial operations available, with a preference for grammars that employ simpler ones.Darryl McAdamshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17446496860034614969noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-41996930865201323982013-01-26T18:12:27.186-08:002013-01-26T18:12:27.186-08:00@AA: I agree with you on those points. I think it ...@AA: I agree with you on those points. I think it is worth emphasizing, though, that the classical arguments for Chomskyan nativism don't depend on the plausibility of some nativist model of language acquisition. That is, the central line of argument was not that the best available acquisition model was nativist (Chomsky didn't really put forward any acquisition model), but rather that people could be shown to know stuff that they couldn't possibly have learned. That line of argument can be very persuasive even in the absence of any plausible acquisition model. Just speaking personally, that's why I don't find my nativist convictions shaken by (what I take to be) the failure of P&P.Alex Drummondhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04676457657606185543noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-45009897404925905392013-01-26T17:16:29.071-08:002013-01-26T17:16:29.071-08:00@AD: I think the connection is being emphasized he...@AD: I think the connection is being emphasized here because if P&P was descriptively (including typologically) adequate, then it would almost certainly provide an explanation of why language is learnable, but the premise appears to be false. I think it's still possible to argue for some kind of Nativism on the basis of typology (especially stuff that doesn't happen, as brought up by Cedric a few posts ago), but it's weaker, less spectacular, and doesn't produce an immediate explanation of learnability.AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-55170673327243480852013-01-26T16:16:25.107-08:002013-01-26T16:16:25.107-08:00Is there perhaps too strong a connection being mad...Is there perhaps too strong a connection being made here between P&P and linguistic nativism? Linguistic nativism of the kind argued for in Chomsky (1965) is perfectly compatible with kids using fancy statistical methods to learn the rules of their native languages. As I read Newmeyer, this is the roughly the kind of model that he has in mind. If your language has, say, a rule of focus movement, then you learn that rule on the basis of the data. But you don't need to learn that focus movement triggers crossover effects, because that comes from UG (and couldn't be learned in any case due to the lack of sufficient data).<br /><br />Poverty of the Stimulus arguments aren't a form of inference to the best explanation. Take the well-known subject/aux inversion case as an example. If we grant the premise that kids never hear examples such as "Has the man who will arrive seen Mary?", then it simply follows logically that a kid could not <i>learn</i> that the structure dependent rule is correct, since all the available data are compatible with both the structure-dependent and linear rules. (Of course, there may well be a learning algorithm which could learn the correct rule, but that algorithm would have to have a built-in bias against the linear rule.) Any given POS argument stands or falls entirely independently of the success of a P&P acquisition model, so the arguments for nativism based on the POS are not tied to P&P.Alex Drummondhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04676457657606185543noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-30614586065513819542013-01-26T14:48:14.430-08:002013-01-26T14:48:14.430-08:00People who are convinced of anything are probably ...People who are convinced of anything are probably a lost cause in any event, smart young people thinking of getting involved with linguistics are I think the most important targets.<br /><br />My interest in statistical learning comes form the fact that the 'Uniqueness Principle' of Culicover & Wexler is clearly false, but a principle of trying to maximize the probability of something being said in a given situation (especially to express a given meaning, if you can guess this from the context and already known word-meanings) has similar effects, without being incompatible with the apparent existence of inexplicable variation.<br /><br />But the lack of a statistical production theory for any of the descriptively developed grammatical frameworks certain is a problem (which can perhaps be temporarily evaded by assuming that all of the ways that the grammar provides for expressing a given meaning are equally probable).AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-36294029322213164382013-01-26T14:31:33.563-08:002013-01-26T14:31:33.563-08:00Pinker (1984) as P&P-ish LFG would be my examp...Pinker (1984) as P&P-ish LFG would be my example of something that, although it's certainly nowhere near fully formalized, addresses descriptive issues and more or less makes sense. All I know about Janet Fodor's work is that it exists, so I can't say to what extent its parameters are toy ones.<br />AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-76449626471500122322013-01-26T06:06:27.934-08:002013-01-26T06:06:27.934-08:00You are not giving up too early -- it's been o...You are not giving up too early -- it's been over 30 years! I think you have shown admirable patience... like many, I have never found P & P theories remotely plausible.<br /><br />But was is the alternative? Even if there is no alternative theory that you like, what is the alternative 'research paradigm'? What do *you* think researchers, who think like us that the central problem is language acquisition, should work on? What is the right direction, in your opinion?Alex Clarkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04634767958690153584noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-7060474507577184092013-01-26T03:16:35.446-08:002013-01-26T03:16:35.446-08:00not convinced argument 2 is that strong, Alex. The...not convinced argument 2 is that strong, Alex. The problem, really, is that we no longer have the principles that we need to get the parameters that we want, so I think we're left with no game in town. We had the idea of a game in town---a great idea---but one that we have had to abandon, not just for empirical arguments, but also theoretical ones (minimalism, broadly construed). People told me I am giving up too early. Perhaps, but that's why I find the quite from Roberts's abstract so interesting. Those who say I've given up too early are giving up too (though they don't always phrase it that way; they still use the word parameter, but it refers to a different thing).Cedric Boeckxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10127112411609144386noreply@blogger.com