The Equilibrium Of Human Syntax

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The Equilibrium of Human Syntax

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 561 pages
File Size : 48,9 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.

The Equilibrium of Human Syntax

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 488 pages
File Size : 53,8 Mb
Release : 2013-09-13
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781136183850

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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.

Symmetrizing Syntax

Author : Hiroki Narita,Naoki Fukui
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 345 pages
File Size : 48,6 Mb
Release : 2021-11-29
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781317371564

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Symmetrizing Syntax by Hiroki Narita,Naoki Fukui Pdf

Symmetrizing Syntax seeks to establish a minimal and natural characterization of the structure of human language (syntax), simplifying many facets of it that have been redundantly or asymmetrically formulated. Virtually all past theories of natural language syntax, from the traditional X-bar theory to the contemporary system of Merge and labeling, stipulate that every phrase structure is "asymmetrically" organized, so that one of its elements is always marked as primary/dominant over the others, or each and every phrase is labeled by a designated lexical element. The two authors call this traditional stipulation into question and hypothesize, instead, that linguistic derivations are essentially driven by the need to reduce asymmetry and generate symmetric structures. Various linguistic notions such as Merge, cyclic derivation by phase, feature-checking, morphological agreement, labeling, movement, and criterial freezing, as well as parametric differences among languages like English and Japanese, and so on, are all shown to follow from a particular notion of structural symmetry. These results constitute novel support for the contemporary thesis that human language is essentially an instance of a physical/biological object, and its design is governed by the laws of nature, at the core of which lies the fundamental principle of symmetry. Providing insights into new technical concepts in syntax, the volume is written for academics in linguistics but will also be accessible to linguistics students seeking an introduction to syntax.

Language, Syntax, and the Natural Sciences

Author : Ángel J. Gallego,Roger Martin
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 381 pages
File Size : 50,6 Mb
Release : 2018-10-18
Category : Computers
ISBN : 9781107152946

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Language, Syntax, and the Natural Sciences by Ángel J. Gallego,Roger Martin Pdf

An exploration of human language from the perspective of the natural sciences, this outstanding book brings together leading specialists to discuss the scientific connection of language to disciplines such as mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology.

Explorations in Maximizing Syntactic Minimization

Author : Samuel D. Epstein,Hisatsugu Kitahara,T. Daniel Seely
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 242 pages
File Size : 49,5 Mb
Release : 2015-04-17
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781317525943

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Explorations in Maximizing Syntactic Minimization by Samuel D. Epstein,Hisatsugu Kitahara,T. Daniel Seely Pdf

This volume presents a series of papers written by Epstein, Kitahara and Seely, each of which explores fundamental linguistic questions and analytical mechanisms proposed in recent minimalist work, specifically concerning recent analyses by Noam Chomsky. The collection includes eight papers by the collaborators (one with Miki Obata), plus three additional papers, each individually authored by Epstein, Kitahara and Seely, that cover a range of related topics including: the minimalist commitment to explanation via simplification; the Strong Minimalist Thesis; strict adherence to simplest Merge, Merge (X, Y) = {X, Y}, subject to 3rd factor constraints; and state-of-the-art concepts and consequences of Chomsky’s most recent proposals. For instance, the volume clarifies and explores: the properties of Merge, feature inheritance and Agree; the nature of phases, cyclicity and countercyclicity; the properties of Transfer; the interpretation of features and their values and the role formal features play in the form and function of syntactic operations; and the specific properties of derivations, partially ordered rule application, and the nature of interface representations. At the cutting edge of scholarship in generative syntax, this volume will be an essential resource for syntax researchers seeking to better understand the minimalist program.

Measuring Grammatical Complexity

Author : Frederick J. Newmeyer,Laurel B. Preston
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 384 pages
File Size : 46,9 Mb
Release : 2014-10-30
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780191508448

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Measuring Grammatical Complexity by Frederick J. Newmeyer,Laurel B. Preston Pdf

This book examines the question of whether languages can differ in grammatical complexity and, if so, how relative complexity differences might be measured. The volume differs from others devoted to the question of complexity in language in that the authors all approach the problem from the point of view of formal grammatical theory, psycholinguistics, or neurolinguistics. Chapters investigate a number of key issues in grammatical complexity, taking phonological, morphological, syntactic, and semantic considerations into account. These include what is often called the 'trade-off problem', namely whether complexity in one grammatical component is necessarily balanced by simplicity in another; and the question of interpretive complexity, that is, whether and how one might measure the difficulty for the hearer in assigning meaning to an utterance and how such complexity might be factored in to an overall complexity assessment. Measuring Grammatical Complexity brings together a number of distinguished scholars in the field, and will be of interest to linguists of all theoretical stripes from advanced undergraduate level upwards, particularly those working in the areas of morphosyntax, psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, and cognitive linguistics.

On Shell Structure

Author : Richard K. Larson
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 505 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2014-02-03
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781134113828

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On Shell Structure by Richard K. Larson Pdf

This volume collects together core papers by Richard K. Larson developing what has since come to be known as the "VP Shell" or "Split VP" analysis of sentential structure. The volume includes five previously published papers together with two major unpublished works from the same period: "Light Predicate Raising" (1989), which explores the interesting consequences of a leftward raising analysis of "NP Shift" phenomena, and "The Projection of DP (and DegP)" (1991), which extends the shell approach to the projection of nominal and adjectival structure, showing how projection can be handled in a uniform way. In addition to published, unpublished and limited distribution work, the volume includes extensive new introductory material. The general introduction traces the conceptual roots of VP Shells and its problems in the face of subsequent developments in theory, and offers an updated form compatible with modern Minimalist syntactic analysis. The section introductions to the material on datives, complex predicates and nominals show how the updated form of shell theory applies in the empirical domains where it was originally developed.

The Boundaries of Babel, second edition

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 328 pages
File Size : 53,5 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.

A Brief History of the Verb To Be

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 305 pages
File Size : 43,9 Mb
Release : 2024-05-21
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780262552059

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A Brief History of the Verb To Be by Andrea Moro Pdf

A journey through linguistic time and space, from Aristotle through the twentieth century's “era of syntax,” in search of a dangerous verb and its significance. Beginning with the early works of Aristotle, the interpretation of the verb to be runs through Western linguistic thought like Ariadne's thread. As it unravels, it becomes intertwined with philosophy, metaphysics, logic, and even with mathematics—so much so that Bertrand Russell showed no hesitation in proclaiming that the verb to be was a disgrace to the human race. With the conviction that this verb penetrates modern linguistic thinking, creating scandal in its wake and, like a Trojan horse of linguistics, introducing disruptive elements that lead us to rethink radically the most basic structure of human language—the sentence—Andrea Moro reconstructs this history. From classical Greece to the dueling masters of medieval logic through the revolutionary geniuses from the seventeenth century to the Enlightenment, and finally to the twentieth century—when linguistics became a driving force and model for neuroscience—the plot unfolds like a detective story, culminating in the discovery of a formula that solves the problem even as it raises new questions—about language, evolution, and the nature and structure of the human mind. While Moro never resorts to easy shortcuts, A Brief History of the Verb To Be isn't burdened with inaccessible formulas and always refers to the broader picture of mind and language. In this way it serves as an engaging introduction to a new field of cutting-edge research.

Formal Grammar

Author : Terje Lohndal
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 448 pages
File Size : 42,7 Mb
Release : 2017-10-12
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781351971911

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Formal Grammar by Terje Lohndal Pdf

This volume draws together fourteen previously published papers which explore the nature of mental grammar through a formal, generative approach. The book begins by outlining the development of formal grammar in the last fifty years, with a particular focus on the work of Noam Chomsky, and moves into an examination of a diverse set of phenomena in various languages that shed light on theory and model construction. Many of the papers focus on comparisons between English and Norwegian, highlighting the importance of comparative approaches to the study of language. With a comprehensive collection of papers that demonstrate the richness of formal approaches, this volume is key reading for students and scholars interested in the study of grammar.

I Speak, Therefore I Am

Author : Andrea Moro
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 97 pages
File Size : 46,6 Mb
Release : 2016-07-05
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780231533928

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I Speak, Therefore I Am by Andrea Moro Pdf

There are no men so dull and stupid, not even idiots, as to be incapable of joining together different words, and thereby constructing a declaration by which to make their thoughts understood.... On the other hand, there is no other animal, however perfect or happily circumstanced which can do the like.—Descartes Language is more like a snowflake than a giraffe's neck. Its specific properties are determined by laws of nature, they have not developed through the accumulation of historical accidents.—Noam Chomsky In I Speak, Therefore I Am, the Italian linguist and neuroscientist Andrea Moro composes an album of his favorite quotations from the history of linguistics, beginning with the Book of Genesis and the power of naming and concluding with Noam Chomsky's metaphor that language is a snowflake. Moro's seventeen linguistic thoughts and his commentary on them display the humanness of language: our need to name and interpret this world and create imaginary ones, to express and understand ourselves. This book is sure to delight anyone who enjoys the ineffable paradox that is human language.

Merge in the Mind-Brain

Author : Naoki Fukui
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 305 pages
File Size : 47,9 Mb
Release : 2017-04-21
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781315442792

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Merge in the Mind-Brain by Naoki Fukui Pdf

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Original Publication Details -- Introduction -- Part I Merge in the Mind -- 1 Merge and Bare Phrase Structure -- 2 Merge and (A)symmetry -- 3 Generalized Search and Cyclic Derivation by Phase: A Preliminary Study -- 4 Merge, Labeling, and Projection -- 5 A Note on Weak vs. Strong Generation in Human Language -- 6 0-Search and 0-Merge -- Part II Merge in the Brain -- 7 The Cortical Dynamics in Building Syntactic Structures of Sentences: An MEG Study in a Minimal-Pair Paradigm -- 8 Syntactic Computation in the Human Brain: The Degree of Merger as a Key Factor -- 9 Computational Principles of Syntax in the Regions Specialized for Language: Integrating Theoretical Linguistics and Functional Neuroimaging -- Bibliography -- Author Index -- Subject Index

Extraterrestrial Languages

Author : Daniel Oberhaus
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 265 pages
File Size : 40,7 Mb
Release : 2024-05-07
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780262548649

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Extraterrestrial Languages by Daniel Oberhaus Pdf

If we send a message into space, will extraterrestrial beings receive it? Will they understand? The endlessly fascinating question of whether we are alone in the universe has always been accompanied by another, more complicated one: if there is extraterrestrial life, how would we communicate with it? In this book, Daniel Oberhaus leads readers on a quest for extraterrestrial communication. Exploring Earthlings' various attempts to reach out to non-Earthlings over the centuries, he poses some not entirely answerable questions: If we send a message into space, will extraterrestrial beings receive it? Will they understand? What languages will they (and we) speak? Is there not only a universal grammar (as Noam Chomsky has posited), but also a grammar of the universe? Oberhaus describes, among other things, a late-nineteenth-century idea to communicate with Martians via Morse code and mirrors; the emergence in the twentieth century of SETI (the search for extraterrestrial intelligence), CETI (communication with extraterrestrial intelligence), and finally METI (messaging extraterrestrial intelligence); the one-way space voyage of Ella, an artificial intelligence agent that can play cards, tell fortunes, and recite poetry; and the launching of a theremin concert for aliens. He considers media used in attempts at extraterrestrial communication, from microwave systems to plaques on spacecrafts to formal logic, and discusses attempts to formulate a language for our message, including the Astraglossa and two generations of Lincos (lingua cosmica). The chosen medium for interstellar communication reveals much about the technological sophistication of the civilization that sends it, Oberhaus observes, but even more interesting is the information embedded in the message itself. In Extraterrestrial Languages, he considers how philosophy, linguistics, mathematics, science, and art have informed the design or limited the effectiveness of our interstellar messaging.

Syntax and Human Experience

Author : Nicolas Ruwet
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 372 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 1991-09-24
Category : Education
ISBN : 0226732223

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Syntax and Human Experience by Nicolas Ruwet Pdf

"[Ruwet] raises fundamental questions about the place of grammar in the study of language and provides several studies which suggest the possibility that some core data are outside the realm of grammatical explanation. A very remarkable book, in which the breadth of Ruwet's reflection is both challenging and deeply rewarding."—Denis Bouchard, University of Quebec, Montreal

The Cambridge Companion to Chomsky

Author : James McGilvray
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 355 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2017-04-13
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781107165892

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The Cambridge Companion to Chomsky by James McGilvray Pdf

This second edition discusses advances in Chomsky's science of language, his view of the human mind and its study, and his socioeconomic-political contributions.