Journal ArticleDOI
The faculty of language: what is it, who has it, and how did it evolve?
TLDR
It is argued that an understanding of the faculty of language requires substantial interdisciplinary cooperation and how current developments in linguistics can be profitably wedded to work in evolutionary biology, anthropology, psychology, and neuroscience is suggested.Abstract:
We argue that an understanding of the faculty of language requires substantial interdisciplinary cooperation. We suggest how current developments in linguistics can be profitably wedded to work in evolutionary biology, anthropology, psychology, and neuroscience. We submit that a distinction should be made between the faculty of language in the broad sense (FLB)and in the narrow sense (FLN) . FLB includes a sensory-motor system, a conceptual-intentional system, and the computational mechanisms for recursion, providing the capacity to generate an infinite range of expressions from a finite set of elements. We hypothesize that FLN only includes recursion and is the only uniquely human component of the faculty of language. We further argue that FLN may have evolved for reasons other than language, hence comparative studies might look for evidence of such computations outside of the domain of communication (for example, number, navigation, and social relations).read more
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Constraints on multiple center-embedding of clauses
TL;DR: This paper analyzed 119 genuine multiple clausal center-embeddings from seven "standard average European" languages (English, Finnish, French, German, Latin, Swedish, Danish) and found that the maximal degree of center embedding in written language is three, whereas in spoken language, multiple center embeddings are practically absent.
Journal ArticleDOI
Recursion, Language, and Starlings
TL;DR: It is shown that the performance of the birds in this study can be explained by a counting strategy, without any appreciation of center-embedding.
Journal ArticleDOI
The evolution of comparative cognition: Is the snark still a boojum?
TL;DR: A selected research program from each area is described, chosen to exemplify current trends and challenges for the field: basic processes, physical cognition, and social cognition.
Journal ArticleDOI
Chimpanzee food calls are directed at specific individuals
TL;DR: The results indicate that great apes can produce semantically meaningful calls in a highly selective, recipient-directed manner, and are inconsistent with traditional views of primate vocalizations as inflexibly and indiscriminately produced.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
Aspects of the Theory of Syntax
Ann S. Ferebee,Noam Chomsky +1 more
TL;DR: Methodological preliminaries of generative grammars as theories of linguistic competence; theory of performance; organization of a generative grammar; justification of grammar; descriptive and explanatory theories; evaluation procedures; linguistic theory and language learning.
Book
Aspects of the Theory of Syntax
TL;DR: Generative grammars as theories of linguistic competence as discussed by the authors have been used as a theory of performance for language learning. But they have not yet been applied to the problem of language modeling.
Book
The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex
TL;DR: In this paper, secondary sexual characters of fishes, amphibians and reptiles are presented. But the authors focus on the secondary sexual characteristics of fishes and amphibians rather than the primary sexual characters.
Book
The Minimalist Program
TL;DR: This twentieth-anniversary edition reissues Noam Chomsky's classic work The Minimalist Program with a new preface by the author, which emphasizes that the minimalist approach developed in the book and in subsequent work "is a program, not a theory."
Journal Article
The descent of man and selection in relation to sex: documento
TL;DR: Part I. Sexual Selection (continued): Secondary sexual characters of fishes, amphibians and reptiles, and secondarySexual characters of birds.