1. Meanings as Instructions for how to Build Concepts Paul M. Pietroski University of Maryland Dept. of Linguistics, Dept. of Philosophy http://www.terpconnect.umd.edu/~pietro

2. Tim Hunter Darko Odic Jeff Lidz Justin Halberda not pictured: Norbert Hornstein

3. Advertisements Some basic questions about words, word meanings, and how they combine A general proposal about what word meanings are, how they combine, and how they relate to psychology A detailed case study of how to bring experimental methods to bear on rather abstract theoretical questions

4. Advertisements Some basic questions about words, word meanings, and how they combine A general proposal about what word meanings are, how they combine, and how they relate to psychology A detailed case study of how to bring experimental methods to bear on rather abstract theoretical questions General Perspective: the questions are better than my answers I study linguistic meaning because of what it reveals about human nature…not because I’m really interested in communication, languages, metaphysics, reference, truth, …

5. One of Aristotle’s Observations Some animals are born early, and take time to grow into their “second nature”

6. One of Aristotle’s Observations Some animals are born early, and take time to grow into their “second nature”

7. InfantChild Modules: Vision Audition … Experience and Growth Language Acquisition Device in its Initial State Modules: Vision Audition … Language Acquisition Device in a Mature State: GRAMMAR LEXICON Catterpillars become Butterflies, Humans acquire Languages

8. Humans acquire Words and Grammars Dramatic change in a critical period, early in the life cycle Large components of this change might well be viewed as “evicted embryology” (or a kind of pupal stage) that allows for environmental influence Of course, infants also acquire concepts in the critical period Hard to see how one could acquire words, as opposed to meaningless sounds (or signs), without acquiring concepts Indeed, one might think that words pair sounds with concepts

9. InfantChild Modules: Vision Audition … initial concepts Experience and Growth Language Acquisition Device in its Initial State Modules: Vision Audition … Language Acquisition Device in a Mature State: GRAMMAR LEXICON acquired concepts initial concepts

10. Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars What are words? What are concepts? What are grammars?

11. Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars What are words? What are concepts? What are grammars? How are words related to concepts and grammars? How are words, concepts, and grammars related to whatever makes humans distinctive, linguistically and cognitively?

12. What makes humans linguistically special? (i)Lexicalization: capacity to acquire words (ii)Combination: capacity to combine words (iii)Lexicalization and Combination (iv) Distinctive concepts that get paired with signals (v) Something else entirely

13. What makes humans linguistically special? (i)Lexicalization: capacity to acquire words (ii)Combination: capacity to combine words (iii)Lexicalization and Combination (iv) Distinctive concepts that get paired with signals

14. What makes humans linguistically special? (i)Lexicalization: capacity to acquire words (ii)Combination: capacity to combine words (iv) Distinctive concepts that get paired with signals

15. What makes humans linguistically special? (i)Lexicalization: capacity to acquire words (ii)Combination: capacity to combine words (iv) Distinctive concepts that get paired with signals FACT: kids are the best lexicalizers on the planet

16. What makes humans linguistically special? (i)Lexicalization: capacity to acquire words FACT: kids are the best lexicalizers on the planet

17. Idea (to be explained and defended) In acquiring words, we use available concepts to introduce new ones 'ride' + RIDE(x 1, x 2 ) ==> RIDE(_) + 'ride' + RIDE(x 1, x 2 ) Words are then used to fetch the introduced concepts when you hear the word ‘ride’…..fetch the concept RIDE(_) The new concepts can be systematically conjoined 'ride fast' RIDE(_) & FAST(_) 'ride horses’ RIDE(_) &  [THEME(_, _) & HORSES(_)] 'ride horses fast’ RIDE(_) &  [THEME(_, _) & HORSES(_)] & FAST(_) ‘ride fast horses’ RIDE(_) &  [THEME(_, _) & FAST(_) & HORSES(_)]

18. What are words, concepts, and grammars? How are they related? How are they related to whatever makes humans distinctive? Did a relatively small change in our ancestors lead to both the "linguistic metamorphosis” that human infants undergo, and significant cognitive differences between us and other primates? Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars

19. What are words, concepts, and grammars? How are they related? How are they related to whatever makes humans distinctive? Did a relatively small change in our ancestors lead to both the "linguistic metamorphosis” that human infants undergo, and significant cognitive differences between us and other primates? Maybe… we’re cognitively special because we’re linguistically special, and we’re linguistically special because we acquire words, and acquiring words is a cognitively creative process, but grammars are simple (or “Minimal” in Chomsky’s sense) Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars

20. Humans Acquire... Words can combine grammatically to form phrases and sentences 'horse', 'brown', 'brown horse', 'horses', 'ride', 'ride horses', 'every’, ‘every horse’, ‘ride every horse’, ‘We saw them ride every brown horse’, … can be understood and used (externally and internally) seem to be distinctively human, although there are many animal communication systems

21. Humans Acquire... Concepts can combine to form complex concepts and thoughts HORSE, BROWN, BROWN_HORSE, HORSES, RIDE, RIDE_HORSES, EVERY, EVERY_HORSE, RIDE_EVERY_HORSE, WE_SAW_THEM_RIDE_EVERY_BROWN_HORSE, … can be used to think about things seem not to be distinctively human, although there are many distinctively human concepts

22. Humans Acquire... Grammars can be used to combine words into phrases and sentences can be used to understand phrases and sentences, in terms of the component words human grammars seem to be distinctively human but other animals surely use various procedures to combine concepts into thoughts (see Fodor, Gallistel)

23. Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars What are words? What are concepts? What are grammars? How are words related to concepts and grammars? How are words, concepts, and grammars related to whatever makes humans distinctive, linguistically and cognitively? How are human grammars related to older animal procedures for combining concepts?

24. Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars What are words? What are concepts? What are grammars? How are words related to concepts and grammars? How are words, concepts, and grammars related to whatever makes humans distinctive, linguistically and cognitively? How are human grammars related to older animal procedures for combining concepts?

25. Concepts: Composable Mental Representations Two Common Metaphors Jigsaw Puzzles 7 th Grade Chemistry -2 +1 H–O–H +1

26. Jigsaw Metaphor A THOUGHT A THOUGHT Unsaturated Saturater Doubly Un- saturated first saturater second saturater one Monadic Concept (adicity: -1) “filled by” one Saturater (adicity +1) yields a complete Thought one Dyadic Concept (adicity: -2) “filled by” two Saturaters (adicity +1) yields a complete Thought Brutus Sang( ) Brutus Caesar KICK(1, 2)

27. 7 th Grade Chemistry Metaphor a molecule of water a molecule of water -2 +1 H(OH +1 ) -1 a single atom with valence -2 can combine with two atoms of valence +1 to form a stable molecule

28. 7 th Grade Chemistry Metaphor -2 +1 Brutus(KickCaesar +1 ) -1

29. 7 th Grade Chemistry Metaphor +1 NaCl -1 an atom with valence -1 can combine with an atom of valence +1 to form a stable molecule +1 BrutusSang -1

30. Extending the Metaphor Aggie Brown( ) Aggie Cow( ) Aggie BrownCow( ) Brown( ) & Cow( ) Aggie is (a) cow Aggie is brown Aggie is (a) brown cow +1

31. Extending the Metaphor Aggie Brown( ) Aggie Cow( ) Aggie Brown( ) & Cow( ) +1 Conjoining two monadic (-1) concepts can yield a complex monadic (-1) concept

32. Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars What are words? What are concepts? What are grammars? How are words related to concepts and grammars? How are words, concepts, and grammars related to whatever makes humans distinctive, linguistically and cognitively? How are human grammars related to older animal procedures for combining concepts?

33. Grammars: Procedures for Combining Words Church: function-in-intension vs. function-in-extension --a procedure that pairs inputs with outputs in a certain way --a set of input-output pairs Frege: each Function determines a "Course of Values” Chomsky: I-language vs. E-language --a biologically implementable procedure that pairs phonological structures (PHONs) with semantic structures (SEMs) --a set of pairs

34. I-Language/E-Language function in Intensionimplementable procedure that pairs inputs with outputs function in Extensionset of input-output pairs |x – 1| + √(x 2 – 2x + 1) {…(-2, 3), (-1, -2), (0, 1), (1, 0), (2, 1), …} λx. |x – 1| = λx. + √(x 2 – 2x + 1) λx. |x – 1| ≠ λx. + √(x 2 – 2x + 1) Extension[λx. |x – 1|] = Extension[λx. + √(x 2 – 2x + 1)]

35. Experience and Growth Language Acquisition Device in its Initial State Language Acquisition Device in a Mature State (an I-Language): GRAMMAR LEXICON PHONs  SEMs 

36. Experience and Growth Language Acquisition Device in its Initial State Language Acquisition Device in a Mature State (an I-Language): GRAMMAR LEXICON PHONs  SEMs initial concepts acquired concepts initial concepts  Articulation and Perception of Signals 

37. Humans acquire words, concepts, and grammars What are words? What are concepts? What are grammars? How are words related to concepts and grammars? How are words, concepts, and grammars related to whatever makes humans distinctive, linguistically and cognitively? How are human grammars related to older animal procedures for combining concepts?

38. It seems that concepts must predate words Old idea: words label concepts Acquiring words is basically a process of pairing concepts with perceptible signals Word combination should mirror concept combination Sentence structure should mirror thought structure

39. Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Word: adicity n Perceptible Signal Further lexical information KICKED(1, 2) ‘Brutus kicked Caesar’ ‘Brutus kicked Caesar the ball’ ‘Caesar was kicked’ ‘Brutus kicked’ ‘Caesar got a kick’ But what about…

40. Puzzles for the idea that Words simply Label Concepts Apparent mismatches between how words combine (grammatical form) and how concepts combine (logical form) KICK(x 1, x 2 ) The baby kicked RIDE(x 1, x 2 ) Can you give me a ride? BEWTEEN(x 1, x 2, x 3 )I am between him and her BIGGER(x 1, x 2 )That is bigger than that FATHER(…?...)Fathers father MORTAL(…?...)Socrates is mortal A mortal wound is fatal

41. Puzzles for the idea that Words simply Label Concepts Apparent mismatches between how words combine (grammatical form) and how concepts combine (logical form) BEWTEEN(x 1, x 2, x 3 )I am between him and her why not: Between I him her BIGGER(x 1, x 2 )This is bigger than that why not: This bigs that

42. Puzzles for the idea that Words simply Label Concepts Apparent mismatches between how words combine (grammatical form) and how concepts combine (logical form)  x 2 :HORSE(x 2 )[RODE(Peter, x 2 )] Peter rode every horse why not: Every horse rode Peter or: Every horse Peter rode That dog is a poodleThat dog is a father That dog is brownThat dog is yours That dog is a brown poodleThat dog is (a) your father

43. Puzzles for the simple idea that Words simply Label Concepts Apparent mismatches between how words combine (grammatical form) and how concepts combine (logical form) Humans are special linguistically AND cognitively Why bother with human syntax (nouns, verbs, prepositions, classifiers,...)? Why not just pair concepts with signals, and pronounce logical forms "straight"? If the labeled concepts can combine without the words, why create the problem of mapping covert expressions into formally distinct overt expressions?

44. It seems that concepts must predate words A less old idea: words help thinkers use available concepts to introduce new ones Acquiring words is a formally creative process Grammatical structure may not reflect initial conceptual structure

45. Lexicalization as Concept-Abstraction Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n (initial concept) Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity k Concept of adicity k Perceptible Signal

46. Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Word: adicity n Perceptible Signal (initial concept) Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity k Concept of adicity k Perceptible Signal Word: adicity k Further lexical information further lexical information Two Pictures of Lexicalization

47. Lexicalization as Monadic-Concept-Abstraction Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n (before) Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity n Concept of adicity -1 Concept of adicity -1 Perceptible Signal Word: adicity -1 KICK(x 1, x 2 ) KICK(event)

48. Experience and Growth Language Acquisition Device in its Initial State Language Acquisition Device in a Mature State (an I-Language): GRAMMAR LEXICON PHONs  SEMs initial concepts acquired concepts initial concepts  Articulation and Perception of Signals 

49. Experience and Growth Language Acquisition Device in its Initial State Language Acquisition Device in a Mature State (an I-Language): GRAMMAR LEXICON PHONs  SEMs initial concepts other acquired------> concepts initial concepts  Articulation and Perception of Signals  introduced concepts