What would it tell you?
Reflecting on a conversation with a computational linguist:
His question was if you knew exactly which neurons were firing when a person heard the word "tree" what would it tell you?
This was a very difficult question to answer because honestly I would have to say not much. However, I would be interested in knowing what neurons fired together in different contexts, different uses, and over time for one subject. And perhaps I'd be interested in the networks across many subjects as well. I would be interested because I'd like to know how fixed these networks are, I think from a Fusterian perspective they might not be that fixed. Perhaps phoneme perception might be more fixed, but the association/recognition of the sound sign would likely vary from use to use. But really, when I think about his question...
I think that we care about fundamentally different issues.
His work is on algorithms that can generate sentences and how generative an algorithm is. Well, that's as far as I understand it. The more any algorithm can account for grammatical utterances the better it is, as far as I can gather. The proof is in the grammatical pudding perhaps. But from my perspective, were I to accept this algorithm, I'd like to know how it is instantiated in the brain. From his perspective, what I am doing explains nothing with regard to grammar which is language to him (well, most likely). However, for me language is more than its grammatical organization. That would be like saying a car was its engine or even that a car is just its physical instantiation without considering the status it conveys, the access it grants to distances further away, or its capacity to carry (or not carry) loads of people and things and so forth.
With this in mind, I look at the neurobiological underpinnings of social behavior and bonding which involves neurotransmitters such as dopamine and opiods under the influence of gonadal steroids, oxcytocin and vasopressin. Then I draw a connection between social behaviorn and bonding to the language learning process and suggest that these systems are involved in the parts of language learning influenced by social bonding.
Where a theoretical linguist will want to know how does a learner acquire the past tense, I will want to know what systems for "other" behaviors may be coopted for language learning. In this way, a) I don't have to wait for a neuron to neuron resolution for word recognition b) I can use what can be done in neuroscience to advance an understanding of language learning and use. Additionally, where a theoretical linguist may believe in a top down rule governing language use, I believe in a bottom up emergence of and socialization to rules. This difference makes communications across disciplines very difficult because it appears to be a difference of worldview and those are nigh impossible to work around.
His question was if you knew exactly which neurons were firing when a person heard the word "tree" what would it tell you?
This was a very difficult question to answer because honestly I would have to say not much. However, I would be interested in knowing what neurons fired together in different contexts, different uses, and over time for one subject. And perhaps I'd be interested in the networks across many subjects as well. I would be interested because I'd like to know how fixed these networks are, I think from a Fusterian perspective they might not be that fixed. Perhaps phoneme perception might be more fixed, but the association/recognition of the sound sign would likely vary from use to use. But really, when I think about his question...
I think that we care about fundamentally different issues.
His work is on algorithms that can generate sentences and how generative an algorithm is. Well, that's as far as I understand it. The more any algorithm can account for grammatical utterances the better it is, as far as I can gather. The proof is in the grammatical pudding perhaps. But from my perspective, were I to accept this algorithm, I'd like to know how it is instantiated in the brain. From his perspective, what I am doing explains nothing with regard to grammar which is language to him (well, most likely). However, for me language is more than its grammatical organization. That would be like saying a car was its engine or even that a car is just its physical instantiation without considering the status it conveys, the access it grants to distances further away, or its capacity to carry (or not carry) loads of people and things and so forth.
With this in mind, I look at the neurobiological underpinnings of social behavior and bonding which involves neurotransmitters such as dopamine and opiods under the influence of gonadal steroids, oxcytocin and vasopressin. Then I draw a connection between social behaviorn and bonding to the language learning process and suggest that these systems are involved in the parts of language learning influenced by social bonding.
Where a theoretical linguist will want to know how does a learner acquire the past tense, I will want to know what systems for "other" behaviors may be coopted for language learning. In this way, a) I don't have to wait for a neuron to neuron resolution for word recognition b) I can use what can be done in neuroscience to advance an understanding of language learning and use. Additionally, where a theoretical linguist may believe in a top down rule governing language use, I believe in a bottom up emergence of and socialization to rules. This difference makes communications across disciplines very difficult because it appears to be a difference of worldview and those are nigh impossible to work around.
posted by Andrea Mates at 9:32 PM
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