87, 94, 14? the nature of linguistic theorystefan/bilder/wp-content/...87, 94, 14? the nature of...

87, 94, 14?The Nature of Linguistic Theory

Frank Richter

Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen

August 29th, 2013

Richter (Universität Tübingen) 87, 94, 14? FU Berlin 1 / 35

In the Beginning

A long-standing, near universal, and erroneous practice of teachingsyntax in a void exists, as if the communicative function of languagehad nothing to do with syntax. And semantics has customarily beentaught in sequence after syntax, or else not at all. Based upongraduate courses taught at XYZ University, this work seeks to redressthis situation by building up syntactic and semantic aspects ofgrammatical theory in an integrated way from the start, under theassumption that neither is of linguistic interest divorced from the other.

In the Beginning

A long-standing, near universal, and erroneous practice of teachingsyntax in a void exists, as if the communicative function of languagehad nothing to do with syntax. And semantics has customarily beentaught in sequence after syntax, or else not at all. Based upongraduate courses taught at Stanford University, this work seeks toredress this situation by building up syntactic and semantic aspects ofgrammatical theory in an integrated way from the start, under theassumption that neither is of linguistic interest divorced from the other.

Cover text: Information-based Syntax and Semantics. Volume I.Fundamentals. 1987

The Story Unfolds

For old hands at HPSG, this volume is a long awaited compendium ofnew developments. For novices, it is bound to be an eye opener. SinceHPSG has become the most widespread grammatical frameworkemployed in computational linguistics, this book is a must for everyoneworking on natural language processing.

Finally there is a comprehensive introduction to HPSG—the linguistictheory favored by many

The Story Unfolds

Finally there is a comprehensive introduction to HPSG—the linguistictheory favored by many computational linguists.

The Story Unfolds

Hans Uszkoreit, 1994: cover text, HPSG

Finally there is a comprehensive introduction to HPSG—the linguistictheory favored by many computational linguists.

Elisabet Engdahl, 1994: cover text, HPSG

The Great Divide

Computational Linguistics◮ (Probabilistic) parsing, machine learning, distributive semantics,. . .◮ Toolkit: corpora, SVMs, (H)MMs, MEMs, t-test,. . .◮ Controlled testing / experimenting◮ Cherished goals: F-scores, levels of significance,. . .◮ Bayesian reasoning

(Mathematically Explicit) Linguistic Theory◮ Phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics◮ Toolkit: categorical analysis, discrete mathematics◮ Theoretical speculation, reasoning, introspective judgments◮ Cherished goals: explanatory theories, elegance, universals◮ Compositional type-logical systems

The Great Divide

Computational Linguistics◮ (Probabilistic) parsing, machine learning, distributive semantics,. . .◮ Toolkit: corpora, SVMs, (H)MMs, MEMs, t-test,. . .◮ Controlled testing / experimenting◮ Cherished goals: F-scores, levels of significance,. . .◮ Bayesian reasoning

(Mathematically Explicit) Linguistic Theory◮ Phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics◮ Toolkit: categorical analysis, discrete mathematics◮ Theoretical speculation, reasoning, introspective judgments◮ Cherished goals: explanatory theories, elegance, universals◮ Compositional type-logical systems

The Evil Empire

An influential view in language acquisition studies is that it is simply amatter of learning symbols used in communication—words, idioms,this sentence, all essentially on a par, acquired by means available toall primates, and a rather arbitrary collection; also finite apart fromsome unspecified methods of “induction” or “analogy” [...]. Cognitivescience is dominated by such approaches to language. These studieshave the merit of being clear enough to evaluate, and can easily beshown to be dramatic failures when they address questions about thenature of language. [...]Most of the work has to do with performance. There has of course never been any

question about the role of statistical analysis and other cognitive processes in

linguistic performance. [...] But that is plainly a very different topic.

The Evil Empire

Chomsky, 2013

. . . and Its Minions

I perceive no gap between generative theory and psycho- orneurolinguistic experimentation. If standard linguistic theory isnevertheless perceived as divorced from cognitive neuroscience,generative grammarians perhaps suffer from a public relations problemrather than a fundamental methodological confusion. (p. 430)

[. . . ] for the quotidian linguist, judgments of, e.g., of grammaticality, arebehavioral data and the connection between such data and linguistictheory should follow the standard scientific methodology of cognitivescience. (p. 432)

The linguist presenting examples of this sort has already performed anexperiment on him/herself or one or more informants. (p. 434)

When properly construed, all judgments of well-formedness and ofpossible sound/meaning connections are measured behavioural datafrom experimental subjects. As such, the standard meat and potatoesof the theoretical linguist do not differ from the everyday bread andbutter of other cognitive psycholinguists. (p. 436)

The short explication of linguistic methodology provided above shouldclarify how generative linguistic theory serves as a theory of languagewithin cognitive neuroscience. The categories and operations ofgenerative grammar are hypotheses about the representations andcomputations in the minds and brains of speakers. The MinimalistProgram makes the claims of generative linguistics more explicit andthus allows for more straightforward testing and falsification of linguistichypotheses. (p. 440)

Marantz, 2005

Confronting the Dragon

I did what I believed right and began a campaign to correct thiswrongdoing. I did not seek to enrich myself. I did not seek to sell USsecrets. I did not partner with any foreign government to guarantee mysafety. Instead, I took what I knew to the public, so what affects all ofus can be discussed by all of us in the light of day, and I asked theworld for justice.

Confronting the Dragon: The Owls Are Not What They Seem

I did what I believed right and began a campaign to correct thiswrongdoing. I did not seek to enrich myself. I did not seek to sell USsecrets.

I did not partner with any foreign government to guarantee my safety.

Instead, I took what I knew to the public, so what affects all of us canbe discussed by all of us in the light of day, and I asked the world forjustice.

Snowden, 2013

The Dragon’s TailLicensing environments of ever according to Hoeksema, 2000

Nobody ever trusted Fred.

I don’t think I could ever trust you.

Do you think I could ever trust you?

If you think I could ever trust you, you’re wrong.

I love you more than I could ever say.

Fred is too smart to ever admit that he wrote the pamphlet.

Few people ever admit that they’re wrong.

Fred was the first to ever swim across the Adriatic.

All I could ever do was gnash my teeth and obey.

Only Fred has ever swum across the Adriatic.

Fred denied ever having had an affair with Edna.

Who would ever trust Fred?

Like I would ever trust Fred!

The Dragon’s Claws

The NPIs in (1), (2), and (4) are strong; the NPI in (3) is weak:

(1) a. John didn’t drink a drop (of alcohol) last night.b. #John drank a drop (of alcohol) last night.c. #Few students drank a drop (of alcohol) last night.

(2) a. Nobody had the slightest inkling about where to go.b. *Few visitors had the slightest inkling about where to go.

(3) a. Frank isn’t much of a soccer player.b. *Peter is much of a soccer player.c. Hardly anyone here is much of a soccer player.

(4) a. This sentence will not parse in a million years.b. #This sentence will parse in a million years.c. #Not many sentences will parse in a million years.

T’was In the Darkest Depths of Mordor

there have been different general types of NPI licensing theories:syntactic, semantic, pragmatic, collocational

each of these approaches faces challenges given the diversity ofNPIs that we observe

typical problems of the three major classes of theories:◮ syntactic theories: arbitrary syntactic marking, relationship to other

syntactic processes unclear, reading dependent behavior of NPIs◮ semantic theories: which type of entailment is correct?, interaction

with syntax unclear, locality and intervention effects unexplained◮ pragmatic theories (e.g. NPIs as indefinites introducing sets of

alternatives (any), end of scale items (minimizers)): different typesof NPIs, pragmatic repair strategies don’t work with NPIs

current number of known NPIs in German: about 280

Into the Light? -: An HPSG Signature

topsign PHON list

CAT catphrase H-DTR sign

NH-DTR signword

listnelist FIRST top

REST listelist

cat HEAD headSUBCAT list

headverbnoun

phonstringutherwalks

append/3

HPSG: A Logical Theory (1)

WORD PRINCIPLE:[

PHON⟨

uther⟩

HEAD nounSUBCAT elist

PHON⟨

walks⟩

HEAD verb

SUBCAT

HEAD nounSUBCAT elist

ID PRINCIPLE:[

phrase]

CAT SUBCAT elist

H-DTR CAT SUBCAT⟨

NH-DTR CAT 1

HEAD FEATURE PRINCIPLE:[

phrase]

CAT HEAD 1H-DTR CAT HEAD 1

CONSTITUENT ORDER PRINCIPLE:[

phrase]

PHON 3H-DTR PHON 2NH-DTR PHON 1

∧ append( 1 , 2 , 3 )

HPSG: A Logical Theory (2)

APPEND PRINCIPLE:∀ 1∀ 2∀ 3

append( 1 , 2 , 3 ) ↔

elist]

∧ 2[

∧ 2 = 3)

∃ 4∃ 5∃ 6

4 | 5⟩

∧ 3⟨

4 | 6⟩

∧ append( 5 , 2 , 6 )

The Intended Interpretation: Model Theories

append =

〈1, 13, 1〉, 〈1, 5, 11〉, 〈13, 1, 1〉, 〈13, 13, 13〉,〈13, 5, 5〉, 〈13, 9, 9〉, 〈13, 11, 11〉,〈5, 13, 5〉, 〈9, 13, 9〉, 〈11, 13, 11〉,〈16, 17, 16〉, 〈17, 16, 16〉, 〈17, 17, 17〉,〈22, 23, 22〉, 〈23, 22, 22〉, 〈23, 23, 23〉,〈23, 26, 26〉, 〈26, 23, 26〉

component = {0, 1, . . . , 14} × {0, 1, . . . , 14} ∪{15, 16, . . . , 20} × {15, 16, . . . , 20} ∪{21, 22, . . . , 29} × {21, 22, . . . , 29}

Additions and Assumptions

Grammar converted into Normal Form Grammar

Connected configurations in interpretations

Maximal connected configurations in interpretations

Minimal exhaustive models

Now What?!-: Two-Dimensional Theory of Idioms

Externally idiosyncratic sign (collocation): Sign whosedistributional restrictions are not predictable on the basis of itsgrammatical properties alone (such as syntactic category,meaning, selection)

Internally idiosyncratic sign (construction; licensed by (phrasal)lexical entry): Sign whose internal structure or whose meaningdoes not follow from the principles of grammar (such as grammarrules, compositionality)[this trivially includes basic words/lexemes]

Come again?Decomposable idiomatic phrases:

(5) a. make waves (cause trouble)b. spill the beans (divulge information)

Non-decomposable idiomatic phrases:

(6) a. saw logsb. trip the light fantastic

(7) a. glauben,believe

X_accX

trittkicks

Pferdhorse

‘be very surprised’b. Ich

Iglaub,believe

michme

trittkicks

Pferd.horse (‘I am very surprised.’)

A Signature for a Two-Dimensional Theory of IdiomsComponents according to Soehn (2006) / Richter & Sailer (2009):

collREQ list (barrier)

barrierLOCAL-LICENSER localSEM-LICENSER lrs

complete_clause utterance

advp np pp vp_ne

barrier

COLL REQ

complete_clause

LOC-LIC[

... LISTEME ...]

Degrees of Idiomaticity

Values of the feature COLL express degrees of idiomaticity

For out purposes: [COLL all-regular]

regular

reg-sem reg-syntax reg-phon irregularREQ list

all-regular

grammatical-idiom extra-grammatical-idiom basic-word

Two-Dimensional Theory of Idioms: Simple Example

ein Schießhund

COLL REQ

ppLOC-LIC 2

CT HD LISTEME wie]

complete_clauseLOC-LIC 1

CT HD LISTEME aufpassen]

SS LOC 2]

aufpasste

SS LOC 1]

(8) (dass)(that)

wielike

Schießhundhunting-dog

aufpasstewatched (‘(that) he was alert’)

When It’s Getting Complex: Into the Fire

phraseSS LOC CONT MAIN surprised′(x 2 )

wordSS LOC 1

LF EXC ’a horse kicks x 2 ’

(DTRS HDTR)+

SS LOC CAT HEAD

TENSE presLISTEME treten

ARG-ST

LISTEME pferd, DEF -, sg]

HEAD CASE acc]

pproINDEX 2

grammatical-idiom

LOC-LIC

HEAD LISTEME surprise-glauben

VAL SUBJ⟨

What It Takes to be an NPI

NPIs may have individual restrictions on their licensing context

NPIs do not have a predictable kind of meaning

NPIs are not licensed by a uniform type of licenser

The syntactic distance licenser/licensee varies

NPIs may have various syntactic constraints

NPIs: The Government and the Soccer World Cup

PHON⟨

scheren⟩

CAT HEAD verbCONTENT MAIN 1 scheren′

all-regular

complete-clause

SEM-LIC[

EXC deint-strength-op( 1 )]

Während der WM scherte sich niemand um die Reformpläne der Regierung.(‘During the world cup nobody bothered about the government’s plans forreforms.’)

NPIs: On John’s Character

PHON⟨

hehl⟩

CAT HEAD nounCONTENT MAIN 1 geheimnis′

all-regular

utterance

SEM-LIC[

EXC de-strength-op( 1 )]

complete-clause

LOCAL-LICENSER[

CAT HEAD LISTEME machen]

Einen Hehl hat Hans aber noch nie daraus gemacht, dass er...(‘John never made a secret of the fact that he...’)

NPIs and What the Pirates Do Best

PHON⟨

beileibe⟩

CAT HEAD

adverbMOD LOC CONT MAIN 2

CONT MAIN 1 beileibe′

all-regular

complete-clause

SEM-LIC[

EXC aa-str-op( 1 )]

utterance

BGR-LIC

presupposedME am-strength-op( 2 )

Es gab beileibe genug Streitpunkte. (‘There were certainly enoughcontroversial issues.’) - apology in response to an (anticipated) allegation

TRALE Implementation

www.sfb441.uni-tuebingen.de/a5/online-grammar/

TRALE Implementation

www.sfb441.uni-tuebingen.de/a5/online-grammar/

The Dragon’s BreathWNPI/-I Der Professor rechnet nicht damit, dass die

Dorfbewohner seine Ausführungen so recht verstehen.The professor does not expect the villagers to understand hisdemonstrations all that well.

WNPI/+I Der Professor rechnet nicht damit, dass mehr als zehnDorfbewohner seine Ausführungen so recht verstehen.The professor does not expect more than ten villagers tounderstand his demonstrations all that well.

SNPI/-I Der Professor rechnet nicht damit, dass seine Studenteneinen blassen Schimmer vom Prüfungsstoff haben.The professor does not expect his students to have a clueabout the exam material.

SNPI/+I Der Professor rechnet nicht damit, dass mehr als zehnseiner Studenten einen blassen Schimmer vomPrüfungsstoff haben.The professor does not expect more than ten of his students tohave a clue about the exam material.

Diagnosis: Foul Smell, Great Balls of Fire!

Results:

Richter & Radó, 2013

The Dragon’s Teeth: The Evil is Always and Everywhere

Spoken vs. written American English

much as a (synchronic) NPI:

(9) a. It doesn’t cost much to do it. (Santa Barbara)b.??It costs much to do it.c. Do you watch much TV? (Switchboard)d.??I watch much TV.

(10) a. They talked and wrote much about elemental functions ofthe body. (Brown)

b. The idea was groundbreaking and sparked muchsubsequent research and controversy. (AmE06)

Lee, 2013

Stairway to Heaven or another Child in Time?

Language is used to communicate ideas. Ideas are mental tools forcoping with a complex and uncertain world. Thus human conceptualstructures should be key to language meaning, and probability—themathematics of uncertainty—should be indispensable for describingboth language and thought. Indeed, probabilistic models areenormously useful in modeling human cognition [...] and aspects ofnatural language.

[...] the connection between cognition, semantics, and belief is notdirect: because language must flexibly adapt to the context ofcommunication, the connection between lexical representation andinterpreted meaning is mediated by pragmatic inference.

Goodman & Lassiter, 2013

The Nature of Linguistic Theory 87

What kind of thing is human language? What is the connectionbetween the sound of a word or phrase, its grammatical structure, andits message or content? What kinds of things are language sounds,grammatical structures, and the pieces of information that linguisticutterances convey? What is it to know a language, and what is it abouta language that makes it possible for people who know it to exchangeinformation?

[...] we will try to introduce and develop an information-basedapproach that considers the objects that make up a human languageas bearers of information within the community of people who knowhow to use them.

Pollard & Sag, 1987

Suppose that Rebecca [...] has just been told “Your cookie is on thetable”. She is confronted with the problem of determining which type ofEnglish linguistic meaning situation [...] she is participating in.What does she have to go on? [..] as an English speaker, she isattuned to a whole system of signs [...].In addition to such language-specific information, still more linguisticinformation arises from constraints which are not particular to a singlerule of a single language, but which hold cross-linguistically [...].If the communication was successful, Rebecca zeros in on the type ofher linguistic situation by combining sensory data with pieces oflinguistic information derived from lexical signs, grammar rules, andprinciples of universal grammar.

Pollard & Sag, 1987

87, 94 – 14!

Information-based linguistics has its roots in a number of distinctresearch traditions within linguistics and neighboring disciplines suchas philosophy, logic, and computer science.

HPSG 87

To do:

Integrate framework with tools and methods rooted in statisticalcomputational linguistics such as the stochastic lambda calculus, andBayesian reasoning.

87, 94 – 14!

HPSG 87

To do:

87, 94 – 14!

HPSG 87

To do:

HPSG 14

Acknowledgments

For collaboration:Fabienne Fritzinger, Janina Radó, Manfred Sailer, Jan-Philipp Söhn,Marion Weller

For inspiration:Sportfreunde Stiller, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Jerry Lee Lewis,Erste Allgemeine Verunsicherung, David Lynch, and especially toEdward Snowden

Quit livin’ on dreams, life is not what it seems.

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