tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post626643704321071022..comments2024-03-28T04:04:55.806-07:00Comments on Faculty of Language: Minimalist Grammars: The Very BasicsNorberthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701059232144474269noreply@blogger.comBlogger101125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-81104315390713369542019-11-28T00:15:54.015-08:002019-11-28T00:15:54.015-08:00Share great information about your blog , Blog rea...Share great information about your blog , Blog really helpful for us . We read your blog , share most useful information in blog . Thanks for share your blog here .<a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07ZDCWB7B" rel="nofollow">ambition</a>murreyterryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10918414279060990269noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-1531768177584896062015-05-15T04:39:42.993-07:002015-05-15T04:39:42.993-07:00This is a very informative post. I just love your ...This is a very informative post. I just love your blog it has very useful posts. Your blog is an extraordinary resource for those interested in languages. Thank you.<br /><a href="http://www.chac-mool.com/" rel="nofollow">Spanish school Costa Rica</a>Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03183255553251603022noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-27888931956042312702014-02-13T15:40:34.003-08:002014-02-13T15:40:34.003-08:00Well how would this go as a justification of bioli...Well how would this go as a justification of biolinguistics:<br /><br />http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2014/01/111506/ucsf-team-reveals-how-brain-recognizes-speech-sounds<br /><br />Features having apparently first been speculatively entertained apparently by Baudouin de Courtenay (Anderson 1985:80 _Phonology in the 20th Century_) and turned into a more substantial theory by Jakobson & Halle, then finally seen in action with surface cortical recordings. In a way that could in principle chose between serious alternatives, such as whether the Jakobson-Halle feature 'strident' or the later proposal 'grooved' is the right way to distinguish between /s/ and /θ/<br />(strident is also true of /f/, grooved isn't).<br /><br />The point being that there's nothing difficult to understand about biolinguistics as a foundational idea of generative grammar, it's simply the proposal that grammatical research can suggest ideas about brain function and organization that might be substantiated or 'embarrassed' by conventional biological methods later, more than a century later in the case of Baudouin's speculations.AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-5065332895383821932014-02-01T01:55:22.815-08:002014-02-01T01:55:22.815-08:00p.s. to Avery: You say:
"and there's no ...p.s. to Avery: You say:<br /><br />"and there's no point in proposing foundations for a field that ordinary workers in that field can't get a reasonable grip on, in the manner than most linguists can basically understand how to use ZF set theory to formalize grammatical theories..."<br /><br />Notice that this is also an excellent argument against proposing biological foundations for linguistics - given that most working linguists know even less about neurobiology than they know about "some very recent math". Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-12819794071803860462014-02-01T01:43:03.993-08:002014-02-01T01:43:03.993-08:00Christina BehmeFebruary 1, 2014 at 1:27 AM
Thank y...Christina BehmeFebruary 1, 2014 at 1:27 AM<br />Thank you for the further challenge Avery. A few points. First, [most] Platonists would say that when you talk about pitch, loudness and duration of actual utterances, you talk about properties of tokens, not types [and even the non-platonist Chomsky would refer to actual utterances as part of "epiphenomenal" E-language]. So I have doubts that Paul Postal would be "somebody [who] wanted to say that all bins in all classification systems are Platonic Objects and the true object of study for anybody who says they are studying the organisms that appear to be using (something like) the systems," AFAIK he studies syntax and leaves much of what you mention here to say psychologists to study. And given that your sentences are not syntactically ambiguous they'd be tokens of the same type. [BTW, studying "just" syntax seems to be a full-time job - so it is not clear why one person would need to be so ambitious and try to generate ALL classification systems that are relevant to language use].<br /><br />Now Katz tried to include phonology in his platonism and came up with the notion of impure sets [I admit I do not entirely understand it so you'd have to work your way through his books if you're interested in it]. Possibly, he might reply that when we take Chomsky's syntactically ambiguous 'Flying planes can be dangerous' and look at the 'variants' [1] - [3] below<br /><br />[1] FLYING planes can be dangerous<br />[2] flying PLANES can be dangerous<br />[3] flying planes can be ... dangerous<br /><br />we'll have again many token of [1]: me saying it with a strong German accent, you saying it with an Aussie accent, a 5 year old girl saying it with a higher pitch than a 30 year old man etc. etc. Same for [2] and [3]. One could further claim that [1] and [2] are not ambiguous while [3] still is and come up with explanations for that [you'd have to check with a platonist if he'd go there].<br /><br />To avoid further prolongation of this discussion: you really have to look carefully at what platonists claim and what they do not claim. Their claims are NOT about contingent properties of tokens [in some possible world all linguistic tokens might be instances of sign language] but about types. And, according to platonists their classification system would NOT "also have to apply to the classifications made by dogs of 'approaching people to be barked at' vs 'approaching people to be greeted'".These might be questions a biolinguist worries about [are they?] but for a platonist [qua platonist] it would not matter whether linguistic tokens are instantiated in humans or parrots or bonobos...<br /><br />re your 'completion of thought': Again, we talk about a question of ontology [what kinds of things sentences ARE]. This is different from epistemology [what can we know about sentences, how can we know what we THINK we know is correct etc.]. So saying ' there's no point in proposing foundations for a field that ordinary workers in that field can't get a reasonable grip on...' seems irrelevant - besides, who stops linguists from seeking help of mathematicians? According to Chomskyans linguistics IS a hugely interdisciplinary field.<br /><br />As pointed out many times on this blog: for the everyday work of most linguists it does not matter what foundational view they have [witness the fruitful collaboration between Postal and Collins]. BUT it does matter for claims of biolinguists whether or not linguistic objects can be [in principle] parts of human brains. Now Chomsky's original arguments against nominalism showed that they can't be [as Katz nicely put it, Chomsky replaced sound nominalism with brain nominalism]Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-63171428187105864862014-02-01T01:27:23.097-08:002014-02-01T01:27:23.097-08:00This comment has been removed by the author.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-66622335722245821142014-01-31T22:43:18.514-08:002014-01-31T22:43:18.514-08:00And, to complete my thought, the unique identity p...And, to complete my thought, the unique identity problem for 'types' (as math objects) turns out to be just as messy as that for tokens, until, perhaps, you've mastered some very recent math that is realistically beyond the grasp of almost all linguists (and there's no point in proposing foundations for a field that ordinary workers in that field can't get a reasonable grip on, in the manner than most linguists can basically understand how to use ZF set theory to formalize grammatical theories (even if they're a bit wobbly on the axiom of choice).<br /><br />If types are taken as object of study, this still looks like a problem to me, whereas if they are taken as tools,it isn't.AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-45581662962545973132014-01-31T18:38:47.973-08:002014-01-31T18:38:47.973-08:00Again, no, because (according to me) the same sent...Again, no, because (according to me) the same sentence claim about (1,2) is about a useful classification system which however is not complete and should not be taken totally for granted. For example, if your studying intonation you would be interested in variants such as traditionally represented as:<br /><br /> FLYING planes are dangerous<br /> flying PLANES are dangerous<br /> flying planes are ... dangerous<br /><br />But for serious study you actually have to measure the phenomena of pitch, loudness and duration of actual utterances, and claims about sameness or difference of sentencehood are not necessarily decisive, but actually behavior is also highly relevant (for example connections between response delay and 'trouble' in Conversation Analysis).<br /><br />If somebody wanted to say that all bins in all classification systems are Platonic Objects and the true object of study for anybody who says they are studying the organisms that appear to be using (something like) the systems, that might be a useful way of looking at things for some purposes, but it would also have to apply to the classifications made by dogs of 'approaching people to be barked at' vs 'approaching people to be greeted').AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-60199878823563529152014-01-29T01:39:13.271-08:002014-01-29T01:39:13.271-08:00@Avery: lets proceede on the most charitable inter...@Avery: lets proceede on the most charitable interpretation: you and I [and Katz&Postal] are talking about different things. For that reason your brick can't hit the target. So let me explain again what Platonists talk about when they use type [or abstract object] Take:<br />[1] Flying planes are dangerous.<br />[2] FLYING PLANES ARE DANGEROUS.<br /><br />[1] and [2] are different tokens and a 4 year old who has not learned that we have upper and lower case letters may think they are [tokens of] different sentences. But we know they are tokens of the same sentence. We also know that if we write one of these tokens on a blackboard and then erase it the type is not created and then destroyed. Now take<br /><br />[3] Visiting relatives can be annoying.<br /><br />It is another token but unlike [1] and [2] it is also a token of a different type. <br /><br />So for the platonist there is one unique type for all tokens of the [1], [2] kind [upper case, lower case, handwritten, on computer screens, on blackboards etc. etc.] and a DIFFERENT unique type for all tokens of the [3] kind. This is all K&P assert in the passage you cite. It has nothing to do with anyone knowing the internal structure of those types. The same is BTW true for diagrams and math structures: you have types and then you have tokens representing these types [the latter can be written down, erased, mailed as e-mail attachments etc. etc.]<br /><br />Now if we ARE talking about the same thing when we use 'platonic objects' then you challenge what K&P wrote because 20 years ago we had no way to determine that [1] and [2] are tokens of the same type. I do not see why anyone would have to accept this - so maybe you can explain why you believe this to be the case?<br /><br />Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-13432258109868001932014-01-28T15:43:22.609-08:002014-01-28T15:43:22.609-08:00@Christina: I think my brick does go in the gener...@Christina: I think my brick does go in the general direction of the target and an fact hits it, on the basis of the first full paragraph of KP1990:523 because the problem with the blackboard sentences and diagrams was that they were supposed to be nonunique, while the alleged Platonic objects didn't have that problem, but, at the time, the only Platonic objects available for concrete discussion were mathematical structures which also have the nonuniqueness problem. So 20 years on people come up with a system where this can be fixed by adopting an axiom, but people who don't have a full grasp of the math might not even want to do that on mere faith. Plus (the brick hitting the target), if you regard the diagrams and math structures as maps, the uniqueness problem is a non-issue. AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-40494047126161996932014-01-27T16:45:20.199-08:002014-01-27T16:45:20.199-08:00@doonyakka: I am afraid if you want to interrogate...@doonyakka: I am afraid if you want to interrogate me you have to reveal your identity, as virtually everyone else on this blog does.<br /><br />In the meantime just two things:<br /><br />1, You are incorrect: one does not need to be a platonist to make the argument that the claims Chomsky makes about the ontology of his 'program' are internally incoherent. <br />2. You seem to attribute to me several claims I do not remember making. Especially the term "Chomsky's playacting at linguistics" seems to be borrowed from Paul Postal: http://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/001686 - so you may want to direct some of your questions at him.<br /><br />To avoid further mix ups please also provide quotes of what I said in future interrogations. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-44959622749665757812014-01-27T13:44:02.876-08:002014-01-27T13:44:02.876-08:00@Christina: My point wasn't so much about Post...@Christina: My point wasn't so much about Postal's platonism, but rather about the fact that, given that you are not a platonist, *your* arguments against biolinguistics boil down to your dislike of the prefix "bio-". Because of this, you say (in so many words) that Chomsky is a charlatan for play-acting at biology and linguistics. <br /><br />You also claim that Chomsky has become somewhat of a laughing stock amongst biologists in the know, for his outdated and outlandish views. As you have read every publication of Chomsky's, I presume you are familiar with his (1993) monograph "Language and Thought", in which he discusses matters of language, biology, and reduction with (amongst others) James Schwartz, Prof. of Neurology and Columbia University. I won't go into specifics due to space, but Chomsky's arguments on pp 79-89 seem (to me at least) to be of far greater subtlety than your accusations of intellectual fraud would warrant. In any case, I'd be interested in your thoughts on that discussion.<br /><br />As I understand it, your criticism is solely that there's nothing concretely biological (yet) about biolinguistics. To me, this is an irrelevance, as well as a misreading of the biolinguistic enterprise, and I'm not even a biolinguist.doonyakkahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02672078319967509135noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-67389514156373631682014-01-27T05:12:30.825-08:002014-01-27T05:12:30.825-08:00@ Benjamin: the comment Alex C. just posted demons...@ Benjamin: the comment Alex C. just posted demonstrates much better than i did why no one [in his right mind] would pretend to be a platonist if his goal were to challenge the credibility of Chomsky [or people working under his framework]: no matter how hostile the debate against Everett or Levinson or Tomasello has been no one ever accused them of depending on divine revelation or a priori reasoning. So it would be much more likely that someone who IS a platonist never admits this in public - so s/he is not exposed to this kind of ostracisation vs. someone who wants to be taken seriously [maybe we can all agree postal wants to be taken seriously?] pretending he's a platonist. This was the only point I was making and Greg seemed convinced and has retracted his argument.<br /><br />The fact that something exists independently of speakers does not entail it is an abstract [platonic] object. The phrase 'abstract linguistic entity' is used to mean several different things as we discussed earlier in this thread. I am not familiar with Tomasello's most recent publications - so if you are really interested in his current view about the nature of linguistic objects it is probably best to e-mail him and ask.<br /><br />@Alex: I am neither a platonist nor do I 'argue for a view i do not believe in just for fun' [you accused me of false dichotomy construction earlier :) I think in light of how little is currently known about the nature of linguistic objects it is a good idea to remain open minded. I have challenged Paul extensively with arguments against platonism [including those you mention] but was not able to refute him - so I am not in a position to say he is wrong.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-24587848439739307182014-01-27T04:18:10.453-08:002014-01-27T04:18:10.453-08:00"The platonist/non-platonist dispute is over ..."The platonist/non-platonist dispute is over linguistic objects themselves: are they abstract objects as Katz and Postal claim or physical objects [like brain states or objects generated by brains or some other type of physical/natural object]."<br /><br />I got that much, but thanks. I still doubt that any of the people you point(ed) out as having some kind of different approach would qualify as holding a view of linguistic representations (the ones attributed to speakers of a language) as representing something like an abstract linguistic entity (and that these things enjoy their existence fully independently of speakers); I may well be wrong, so if you have any suggestive reference, I'd love to see it. Then again, it doesn't really matter that much.benjamin.boerschingerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00894608988488218285noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-127012310497858772014-01-27T04:12:43.086-08:002014-01-27T04:12:43.086-08:00@Christina If linguistic objects are platonic (is ...@Christina If linguistic objects are platonic (is this what you claim? or are you arguing for a position you don't believe in just for fun?) then the epistemological problem goes very deep -- if they are causally inert objects that exist outside of space and time, then no scientific methodology can tell us anything about them. Thus any knowledge we have must come from divine revelation, or some a priori reasoning, and we probably don't like the first being good post enlightenment thinkers, nor the second because many linguistic facts are clearly historically contingent. So while it seems like you might be able to rescue mathematical platonism using the second fork, .e.g via plenitudinous platonism, linguistic platonism is dead in the water. <br /><br />This is a different question from the question of how we can investigate linguistic facts if we take them to be neurally/biologically real. Which is a methodological question which raises no particular epistemological issues beyond the standard scientific ones that affect all scientific theories that posit unobservable entities.Alex Clarkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04634767958690153584noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-33193513407991054382014-01-27T03:50:09.118-08:002014-01-27T03:50:09.118-08:00@Benjamin: Keep in mind there is a difference betw...@Benjamin: Keep in mind there is a difference between structured representations and the objects they are representations of. In the case of linguistic objects the ontological status of the representations is not under dispute [Postal accepts that tokens of linguistic objects are physical/biological objects]. The platonist/non-platonist dispute is over linguistic objects themselves: are they abstract objects as Katz and Postal claim or physical objects [like brain states or objects generated by brains or some other type of physical/natural object]. <br /><br />What Alex alludes to is the question: how can we know about linguistic objects [or that our representations of them are correct]? If linguistic objects are some kind of concrete objects we can [in principle] learn everything there is to know about them with methods of the natural sciences. If the are abstract [=platonic] objects we needs different methods and so far we do not know what kinds of methods would be reliable [remember how long it took for humans to develop reliable scientific methods - and some philosophers claim even our current methods are not terribly reliable]. So the epistemological worries Alex mentions are certainly valid.<br /><br />Now obviously if someone hypothesizes linguistic objects are a certain kind of natural object s/he can be incorrect. This is what the dispute between someone like Chomsky and Tomasello is about: Chomsky claims there exist some language specific brain structures, Tomasello denies this and claims there are only 'general purpose brain structures that are recruited for linguistic tasks' [to be clear this is a very crude cartoon]. It is possible [in principle] to test these competing hypotheses with the methods of the natural sciences; you "look at" brains and either find some special structures or you do not find any. Of course in reality it is way more complicated than this [our current methods for 'looking at' brains are still very crude] but it is at least in principle possible to decide these disputes exclusively with methods of the natural sciences. Another dispute is about the details of the internal structure of linguistic objects. Again, if you hold linguistic objects are natural objects you can ultimately hope to uncover their internal structure with methods of the natural sciences. <br /><br />I do not know how much Tomasello worries about ontology besides being firmly committed to a naturalist ontology [he holds we invented numbers, Chomsky seems uncommitted on this issue] and as far as I know Ray Jackendoff is also a committed naturalist [but you have to check with him].Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-51351781562290929702014-01-27T02:48:25.960-08:002014-01-27T02:48:25.960-08:00Is that true? Granted, I'm not very familiar w...Is that true? Granted, I'm not very familiar with the specific formal proposals of Tomasello's or Everett's (despite having read books by either), but standard Construction Grammar approaches also involve talk of structured representations, no? If you have any reference where there is a proper formal treatment by Tomasello or Everett that illustrates the crucial difference, that'd be greatly appreciated.<br /><br />Out of interest, what about a view such as the one expounded by Jackendoff in his "Foundations of Language"?benjamin.boerschingerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00894608988488218285noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-9461020380594032892014-01-27T02:38:46.512-08:002014-01-27T02:38:46.512-08:00@Benjamin: none of the other views invoke the exis...@Benjamin: none of the other views invoke the existence of abstract objects. So from an ontological point of view all the people I listed agree that concrete [physical, 'natural'] objects are the only objects that have real existence and can be studied by science. This does of course not entail that their theories are uncontroversial. But, so to speak, they all play on the same [ontological] team against the Platonist. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-28391813085524824832014-01-27T02:19:30.391-08:002014-01-27T02:19:30.391-08:00@Avery: you may of course do whatever you find ent...@Avery: you may of course do whatever you find entertaining but if the brick is meant to have any effect on the arguments for platonism it ought to be chucked at least in its general direction. Yours seems so far off that I must miss something. You say:<br /><br />But there is no single abstract mathematical object that they could have been talking about prior to the recent invention of 'univalent foundations' a few years ago, since any mathematical representation of a linguistic structure has a proper class of isomorphic functional equivalents (for example trees can be formalized in many different ways, using pretty well anything as nodes and arcs or representatives thereof).<br /><br />This argument seems to give epistemology priority over ontology: before we had discovered [invented?] 'univalent foundations' there could not have been a single mathematical object? Platonists hold abstract mathematical objects exist INDEPENDENTLY of us - so whatever we discover or invent has no impact on them. But, since you deny platonism lets take a concrete example: you seem to say before we had figured out that gamma ray bursts "consist of a narrow beam of intense radiation released during a supernova or hypernova as a rapidly rotating, high-mass star collapses to form a neutron star, quark star, or black hole" supernovas, quark stars and black holes did not exist? <br /><br />Your blackboard argument [if I understand it correctly] seems to be an argument for nominalism. Even people who utterly dislike Postal/Katz can look at Chomsky's arguments against nominalism - they seem sound to me. <br /><br />I did not want to discuss platonism again but since you brought it up I like to say something about the reason Alex C [and i think implicitly Greg as well?] has given for rejecting it: "linguistic Platonism is intellectually indefensible [because] the epistemological problems are insurmountable". Assuming this argument to be true it seems to suggest unless we can know something it cannot exist - we cannot know platonic objects hence they cannot exist. Again we let epistemology trump ontology. Yet, at any given time in our history there have been things people thought we could not possibly know. But isn't this what science is about - uncovering things we never knew before? <br /><br />This brings me to a point Katz made long ago: Alex is probably right when he insists that everything knowable has to be discovered with the methods of natural [physical] science. But it is the claim of the Platonist that abstract objects are not of the same kind as concrete objects - hence not to be studied with the same methods as concrete objects. Now you may call 'irrational' and 'occult pseudoscience' at such a suggestion or you may look at the work Postal actually does - it does not look irrational to me. <br /><br />Further, it seems to be the case that by far not all epistemological problems have been solved for any non-platonist linguistics. Chomsky claims by now linguistic creativity could be one of 'the mysteries of nature, forever hidden from our understanding' - should we therefore abandon the natural sciences as well? I know how you will answer this rhetorical question. But then why single out linguistic platonism? It is in a way ironic that Katz and Postal have paid more attention to biology than many biolinguists: the fact that [according to them] languages have properties that objects generated by any biological organ could not have led them to conclude that the Chomskyan paradigm must be incorrect. So their opposition to biolinguistics is grounded in ontology [the way the world IS] not in epistemology [what we [currently] can know about the world]. I think, if one wants to prove K&P wrong, it is at least worth taking them on on these grounds instead of insisting that epistemology ought to trump ontology. <br /><br />Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-8099923929406800862014-01-27T02:02:13.855-08:002014-01-27T02:02:13.855-08:00Christina wrote: "[maybe join forces with Tom...Christina wrote: "[maybe join forces with Tomasello or Everett or - take a pick anything would make more sense than platonism]."<br /><br />This is something that is puzzling me --- how is, from an "ontological" point of view, Everett's or Tomasello's position any more respectable than the "Chomskyan" one? If the alleged incoherence is completely independent of a nativist or domain-specific assumptions, how is, say, a Cognitive Grammar approach less philosophically suspect than a Generative Grammar one?benjamin.boerschingerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00894608988488218285noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-79599258253372644502014-01-26T20:57:32.034-08:002014-01-26T20:57:32.034-08:00For the entertainment value of chucking a random b...For the entertainment value of chucking a random brick at an argument for Platonism, consider this for the 'type argument':<br /><br />"Consider the much-cited example 'Flying planes can be dangerous'. Generative grammarians who discussed this example were not talking about tokens on their blackboards. If they had been, they would not have been talking about the same thing. But if different grammarians were talking about different things in such circumstances, grammar would lack a common subject matter."<br />KP1990:523. <br /><br />But there is no single abstract mathematical object that they could have could have been talking about prior to the recent invention of 'univalent foundations' a few years ago, since any mathematical representation of a linguistic structure has a proper class of isomorphic functional equivalents (for example trees can be formalized in many different ways, using pretty well anything as nodes and arcs or representatives thereof).<br /><br />Whereas, even if the universe is open, there is probably only a denumerale infinity of actual blackboard representations of grammatical structure trees in it. Even now, I wouldn't be surprised if zero linguists really understood the tools that can now be used to turn isomorphism into identity (I certainly don't). As best as I can make out, Postal accepts mathematical representations as Platonic objects that, for him, linguists are supposed to study. But they don't provide a unique object of study. This is not a problem if you are using them as a tool - having 3000 functionally identical copies of a single lens is not a problem, as long as you have the one(s) you need.<br />AveryAndrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17701162517596420514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-44008257188956505782014-01-26T15:57:46.063-08:002014-01-26T15:57:46.063-08:00@Christina: I should not have attributed this read...@Christina: I should not have attributed this reading to Postal; I stand corrected. I should have said that if this is what were meant I would find it a much more reasonable position.<br /><br />As for the algorithms, there are algorithms that partition the space of expressions (into grammatical and ungrammatical) for every way of partitioning them that can be given as a minimalist grammar. (The same holds true for richer formalisms, such as LFG with an offline parsability constraint). Whether one of these is `right', I cannot say.<br />Greg Kobelehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08006251459440314496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-29894818591957692182014-01-26T14:38:27.012-08:002014-01-26T14:38:27.012-08:00Do we need it? Well for principle A and C effects ...Do we need it? Well for principle A and C effects it's pretty close to being right. The Barker stuff, as I recall, concentrated mainly on pronominal binding. We can get things like 'everyone's mother lives him' with binding and also inverse linking. But importantly, this is not what we find for principe C effects or reflexivization or control: note *'everone's mother loves himself' is pretty poor, I.e. Lousy. So. Do we need it. Descriptively it does not seem to reduce to scope. Principe C is even worse. So, though I agree that Barker is right about the pronominal data (btw, something long known by looking at inverse linking and almost c-command stuff) I don't see how your speculation does much for A and C effects. At any rate, what we will need is analysis, not assertion, so I await your proposal. Btw, one reason I always like movement analyses of binding/control is that in conjunction with extension they come close to deriving the c-command condition. Chains have c-commanding links. Extension enforces this (at least in single rooted trees) so if binding reduces to movement, c-command follows. A nice cheap derivation. I've always liked it and continue to. Norberthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15701059232144474269noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-14662612439772900362014-01-26T13:31:00.621-08:002014-01-26T13:31:00.621-08:00@Norbert: Do we need C-command? Dunno. Either way ...@Norbert: Do we need C-command? Dunno. Either way is fine with me.<br /><br />Why is C-command relevant where it (apparently) is? Well, you know I've been pushing an answer to this for, ummm, a while (Richardson & Chametzky 1985; Chametzky 1996; Chametzky 2000; Chametzky 2011). Basic idea: if there are to be linguistic relations between consenting positions in a P(hrase) M(arker) that aren't in a a dominance relation, then C-command is the (formal) relation that will mediate such linguistic relations. C-command is a generalization of the sister relation, providing what I've called the "minimal factorization" of a PM with respect to a node/position in that PM (Richardson/Chametzky C-command 'takes the viewpoint of the commandee'). So: why does C-command mediate the linguistic relations it does? Because if SOMETNING has to, then C-command is the minimal 'next thing' outside of dominance. All of which I've said before (and before and before . . . ). Now, maybe it isn't true (maybe C-command isn't necessary or doesn't work), but I don't think this has ever been a BORING idea.<br /><br />--RCRob Chametzkyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04943531685307739334noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5275657281509261156.post-69901983540846510132014-01-26T13:13:36.311-08:002014-01-26T13:13:36.311-08:00@ doonyakka: I am afraid Alex C. would not approve...@ doonyakka: I am afraid Alex C. would not approve if I were to go one more time over the arguments Postal gives for Platonism. So just very brief: the extra step is NOT the problem. If you are interested in the arguments for Platonism I recommend: http://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/001607 as a good starting point. I have also explained several times why i object to calling something that involves no reference to biology bio-linguistics - so just one point [again]: it shows very little respect for the work of biologists to engage in these pretentious, yet empty claims. You probably would find it odd if I would claim to have made great discoveries in 'chemo-linguistics' or maybe 'astro-linguistics' that have nothing to do with chemistry or astronomy. For more details why I think linguists should distance themselves from the many pretentious claims Chomsky has made recently have a look at: http://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/001592<br /><br />@Greg: Apologies that I misunderstood your statement - so you are saying there is at least one algorithm known that partitions all grammatical expressions of English from the ungrammatical expressions?<br /><br />You are of course free to find platonism indefensible. But it does not seem to follow that Postal has been dishonest numerous times when he has in print adopted and defended this position. Don't you think it makes very little sense to exaggerate one's commitment to a position that is as hugely unpopular as Platonism if one's goal is to 'countervail' Chomsky's position? Or, given how persistently Chomsky has ignored any criticism by Postal would it make any sense to continue the ruse if Postal really is not committed to Platonism? If you think Postal is dishonest, would he not reason that he'd stand a much better chance to achieve his goal if he pretended to defend a more popular position? [maybe join forces with Tomasello or Everett or - take a pick anything would make more sense than platonism]. I hope you did not want to attribute this combination of stupidity and dishonesty to Postal. <br />Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03443435257902276459noreply@blogger.com