Impossible Languages

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 157 pages
File Size : 48,7 Mb
Release : 2023-09-19
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780262549233

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Impossible Languages by Andrea Moro Pdf

An investigation into the possibility of impossible languages, searching for the indelible “fingerprint” of human language. Can there be such a thing as an impossible human language? A biologist could describe an impossible animal as one that goes against the physical laws of nature (entropy, for example, or gravity). Are there any such laws that constrain languages? In this book, Andrea Moro—a distinguished linguist and neuroscientist—investigates the possibility of impossible languages, searching, as he does so, for the indelible “fingerprint” of human language. Moro shows how the very notion of impossible languages has helped shape research on the ultimate aim of linguistics: to define the class of possible human languages. He takes us beyond the boundaries of Babel, to the set of properties that, despite appearances, all languages share, and explores the sources of that order, drawing on scientific experiments he himself helped design. Moro compares syntax to the reverse side of a tapestry revealing a hidden and apparently intricate structure. He describes the brain as a sieve, considers the reality of (linguistic) trees, and listens for the sound of thought by recording electrical activity in the brain. Words and sentences, he tells us, are like symphonies and constellations: they have no content of their own; they exist because we listen to them and look at them. We are part of the data.

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 328 pages
File Size : 46,5 Mb
Release : 2015-11-20
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780262329682

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The Boundaries of Babel, second edition by Andrea Moro Pdf

The new edition of a pioneering book that examines research at the intersection of contemporary theoretical linguistics and the cognitive neurosciences. In The Boundaries of Babel, Andrea Moro describes an encounter between two cultures: contemporary theoretical linguistics and the cognitive neurosciences. As a leading theoretical linguist in the generative tradition and also a neuroscientist, Moro is uniquely equipped to tell this story. Moro examines what he calls the “hidden” revolution in contemporary science: the discovery that the number of possible grammars is not infinite and that their number is biologically limited. This will require us to rethink not just the fundamentals of linguistics and neurosciences but also our view of the human mind. Moro searches for neurobiological correlates of “the boundaries of Babel”—the constraints on the apparent chaotic variation in human languages—by using an original experimental design based on artificial languages exploiting neuroimaging techniques. This second edition includes a new chapter in which Moro extends the exploration of the boundaries of Babel in search of the source of order with which all human languages are endowed. Reflecting on the emerging methodology that obtains physiological data from awake brain surgery, Moro shifts from considering where the neurophysiological processes underlying linguistic competence take place—that is, where neurons are activated—to considering the neuronal code involved in these processes—that is, what neurons communicate to each other. This edition also features a substantive new foreword by Noam Chomsky synthesizing the major issues theoretical syntax will face in the near future.

Author : David Adger
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
Page : 273 pages
File Size : 46,7 Mb
Release : 2019
Category : LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES
ISBN : 9780198828099

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Language Unlimited by David Adger Pdf

Human language allows us to plan, communicate, and create new ideas, without limit. Yet we have only finite experiences, and our languages have finite stores of words. Drawing on research from neuroscience, psychology, and linguistics, David Adger takes us on a journey to the hidden structure behind all we say (or sign) and understand.

Author : Noam Chomsky,Andrea Moro
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 138 pages
File Size : 48,5 Mb
Release : 2022-05-03
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780262369046

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The Secrets of Words by Noam Chomsky,Andrea Moro Pdf

Two distinguished linguists on language, the history of science, misplaced euphoria, surprising facts, and potentially permanent mysteries. In The Secrets of Words, influential linguist Noam Chomsky and his longtime colleague Andrea Moro have a wide-ranging conversation, touching on such topics as language and linguistics, the history of science, and the relation between language and the brain. Moro draws Chomsky out on today’s misplaced euphoria about artificial intelligence (Chomsky sees “lots of hype and propaganda” coming from Silicon Valley), the study of the brain (Chomsky points out that findings from brain studies in the 1950s never made it into that era’s psychology), and language acquisition by children. Chomsky in turn invites Moro to describe his own experiments, which proved that there exist impossible languages for the brain, languages that show surprising properties and reveal unexpected secrets of the human mind. Chomsky once said, “It is important to learn to be surprised by simple facts”—“an expression of yours that has represented a fundamental turning point in my own personal life,” says Moro—and this is something of a theme in their conversation. Another theme is that not everything can be known; there may be permanent mysteries, about language and other matters. Not all words will give up their secrets.

Author : Michael Gordin
Publisher : Profile Books
Page : 740 pages
File Size : 51,9 Mb
Release : 2015-03-19
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781847659583

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Scientific Babel by Michael Gordin Pdf

Today, the language of science is English. But the dominance of this particular language is a relatively recent phenomenon - and far from a foregone conclusion. In a sweeping history that takes us from antiquity to the modern day, Michael D. Gordin untangles the web of politics, money, personality and international conflict that created the monoglot world of science we now inhabit. Beginning with the rise of Latin, Gordin reveals how we went on to use (and then lose) Dutch, Italian, Swedish and many other languages on the way, and sheds light on just how significant language is in the nationalistic realm of science - just one word mistranslated into German from Russian triggered an inflammatory face-off between the two countries for the credit of having discovered the periodic table. Intelligent, revealing and full of compelling stories, Scientific Babel shows how the world has shaped science just as much as science has transformed the world.

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 561 pages
File Size : 53,7 Mb
Release : 2013-09-13
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781136183843

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The Equilibrium of Human Syntax by Andrea Moro Pdf

This book assembles a collection of papers in two different domains: formal syntax and neurolinguistics. Here Moro provides evidence that the two fields are becoming more and more interconnected and that the new fascinating empirical questions and results in the latter field cannot be obtained without the theoretical base provided by the former. The book is organized in two parts: Part 1 focuses on theoretical and empirical issues in a comparative perspective (including the nature of syntactic movement, the theory of locality and a far reaching and influential theory of copular sentences). Part 2 provides the original sources of some innovative and pioneering experiments based on neuroimaging techniques (focusing on the biological nature of recursion and the interpretation of negative sentences). Moro concludes with an assessment of the impact of these perspectives on the theory of the evolution of language. The leading and pervasive idea unifying all the arguments developed here is the role of symmetry (breaking) in syntax and in the relationship between language and the human brain.

Author : Raúl Aranovich
Publisher : John Benjamins Publishing
Page : 290 pages
File Size : 43,7 Mb
Release : 2007-03-22
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9789027292568

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Split Auxiliary Systems by Raúl Aranovich Pdf

The alternation between the auxiliaries BE and HAVE, which this collection examines, is often discussed in connection with generative analyses of split intransitivity. But this book's purpose is to place the phenomenon in a broader context. Well-known facts in the Romance and Germanic language families are extended with data from lesser studied languages and dialects (Romanian, Paduan), and also with experimental and historical data. Moreover, the book goes beyond the usual language families in which the phenomenon has been studied, with the inclusion of two chapters on Chinese and Korean. The theoretical background of the contributors is also broad, ranging from current Generative approaches to Cognitive and Optimality-Theoretical frameworks. Readers interested in the structural, historical, developmental, or experimental aspects of auxiliary selection should profit from this book's comprehensive empirical coverage and from the plurality of contemporary linguistic analyses it contains.

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 498 pages
File Size : 48,5 Mb
Release : 1885
Category : China
ISBN : STANFORD:36105004973967

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Chinese Recorder and Missionary Journal by Anonim Pdf

Includes section "Our book table."

Author : Tamilla Mammadova
Publisher : Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Page : 285 pages
File Size : 46,6 Mb
Release : 2021-09-20
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781527574960

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Cultural Diversity in Cross-Cultural Settings by Tamilla Mammadova Pdf

The 21st century is marked by the intensive movement of people across international borders. While languages are used as a means of interaction across the globe, the nuances of communication vary from culture to culture. This book explores how the misperception of cultural values and norms may result in misapprehension and communication breakdowns in various settings.

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 720 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 1893
Category : Electronic
ISBN : PRNC:32101064468224

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The Westminster Review by Anonim Pdf

Author : Wymetal
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 336 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 1886
Category : Electronic
ISBN : UBBS:UBBS-00066300

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Mormon Portraits Or the Truth about the Mormon Leaders from 1830 to 1886 by Wymetal Pdf

Author : George Porter
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 508 pages
File Size : 51,7 Mb
Release : 1891
Category : Bombay (India)
ISBN : COLUMBIA:CR59941723

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The Letters of the Late Father George Porter, S.J., Archbishop of Bombay by George Porter Pdf

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 990 pages
File Size : 46,7 Mb
Release : 1888
Category : Electronic
ISBN : PSU:000060098511

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Methodist Magazine and Quarterly Review by Anonim Pdf

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 722 pages
File Size : 49,8 Mb
Release : 1893
Category : Electronic
ISBN : MINN:31951002476494I

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London and Westminster Review by Anonim Pdf

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 1018 pages
File Size : 42,8 Mb
Release : 1888
Category : Methodist Church
ISBN : WISC:89082414012

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The Methodist Review by Anonim Pdf