A language experiment

[Ayndryl]

antbez,

Eddag-1240 and Elyam-2200 are not programs. They are the label that we assign to the output, once the system reaches a stable minimum. The system we are developing is called "Nodespaces", and it is coupled to a statistical mechanical program called "Vectorial".

What they do is implementing the Ising model, and all-time classic of statistical mechanical modelling. Originally, it was proposed to explain ferromagnetism, but the model is so powerful that it has over the years been adapted and applied to the study of a variety of phenomena, including language contact and language drift. "Vectorial" is a dynamical system, that is, a rule that given one point in a state space, it tells us where it is going to be a unit of time later. The basic mathematical model is thus a manifold M, a map f:M-->M and a function s:M-->R.

Now, M represents all the possible states of the system, while f represents the time evolution, a rule that determines what is the state one unit of time later. For many practical cases, after some time the system converges to a subset of M of low dimension, usually called the "attractor". The partition function is controlled by a so-called critical exponent (beta). The numbers 1240 and 2200 means that we ran the system for beta=2.2 and beta=1.240. Note that a small change in the critical exponent yields a totally different language for the same input.

Your question on how are they connected with language can now be answered: as we have records of, say, Old Welsh, Middle Welsh, and Modern Welsh, then we have a traceable history of how Welsh changed. This is our Welsh manifold M. The rules defining each state is given, roughly, by linguists (phonology rules, consonantal conservation, pallatization, etc.). Therefore, you can code the system to apply those rules to Modern Welsh and see what comes out. Of course, human brain is not a logical system: it is a highly complex and strange system. Nobody knows why a given change started operating in a given language, or why speakers gradually start modifying the language. Also, cultural and cognitive factors must be called for. This means we are facing a system that cannot be specified in an algorithmic way, neither using a rule-based approach. You need to use statistical mechanical maths.

Alexandra,

You pose the question of whether is it possible the transformation of Welsh into a language so different and unintelligible for today's speakers during a period so short as sixty-five years. How much time does a language take to change depends on many extra-linguistic factors. Isolation, the foundation effect, language contact, speakers' fragmentation in space, even religious, political, and social factors do all play a role. There is no definite answer to why some languages die, or to why they change the way they do.

But no, I'm sure 65 years is too a short time lapse for a radical change as the one you notice from Welsh to Weddag-2075. But the intriguing question is this: though they are structurally different, and lexically unrelated, what's the "Welshness" in Weddag-2075 as to make some people believe it is some sort of Welsh?


Demetrius,

I totally agree with the conclusion of the article, that is: "Russian, as well as any other language, despite it's obvious and unquestionable virtues, is by no means an ideal mirror for reflecting reality". In fact, there is a school of thought that holds that language "infects" reality.

You state that you you don't believe that feelings and words are directly related. Margaret Magnus, and the school of phonosemantics -aka sound symbolism-, has made interesting experiments with students to which she presents images of objects and ask them to label them with words. Some of them are impossible objects, or even non-existent, and the students are required to invent words for those objects. Surprisingly, there is a preference for using words with specific phonemes for certain objects. Her dissertation is available in the internet (it is titled Phonosemantics: What's in a word?).

Your statement related to the dependency of words on culture has been, and is, thoroughly researched by Anna Wierzbicka. You can find her books in the internet, too. My example on Russian was taken from her. Your question on whether there is any proof that the feelings of a Lakota and a Russian are different in any way has a positive answer: there are proofs. There are cognitive tests that consistently prove a speaker of a certain language perceives reality in a different way than a speaker of another language. I know this sounds somehow shocking, but it is that way.

I don't understand your last statement: "language doesn't neccessarily correspond to our feelings". Unless a speaker wishes to lie, we have to accept that anything that it is said it is also meant, I mean, you say what you mean, otherwise communication would be impossible. Your article makes the point: there are feelings for which we do not have words. There are emotions for which we have no words. But the results from Wierzbicka's research is even more radical: there are speakers from a certain language that do have emotions that speakers of another language do not. This is baffling, but true.


NB: if anyone here find it difficult to get the books, I will be pleased to post the links.