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Zuidema, W. and Westermann, G. (2001) Towards formal models of embodiment and self-organization of language. In Workshop Developmental Embodied Cognition. Edinburgh.
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Towards Formal Models of Embodiment and Self­organization of Language
Willem H. Zuidema
Artificial Intelligence Laboratory
Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussels
Belgium
Gert Westermann
Sony CSL­Paris
6, rue Amyot, 75005 Paris
France
Abstract Research in language evolution is concerned with the question of how complex linguistic structures can emerge from the interactions between many communicating indi­ viduals. As such it complements psycholinguistics which investigates the processes involved in individual adult lan­ guage processing, and child language development stud­ ies, investigating how children learn a given (fixed) lan­ guage. We focus on the framework of language games and argue that they offer a new perspective on many current debates in cognitive science, including those on the synchronic vs. diachronic perspective on language, the embodiment and situatedness of language and cogni­ tion, and the self­organization of linguistic patterns. We present a model of lexical dynamics that shows the spon­ taneous emergence of near­optimal characteristics of a lexicon in a distributed population of individuals. Finally, we analyze the shortcomings of our models and discuss how research in cognitive science could contribute to im­ proving them.
Introduction There exists a long tradition of formulating and study­ ing formal models of language processing and language learning. These models have generally focused on the the linguistic competence of a single individual (e.g. Chom­ sky, 1980). They have proven to be appealing because the formalisms offer precision and clarity, they have led to successful technology, and they have allowed for extensive theoretical research to complement empirical work. However, these competence­models have abstracted away many arguably crucial characteristics of language. These abstractions are viewed with growing uneasiness by cognitive scientists, linguists, and other researchers. Some of their concerns are well­known: ...
BibTex
@inproceedings{zuidema01towardsFormal,
  author={W. Zuidema and Gert Westermann},
  title={Towards formal models of embodiment and self-organization of language},
  year={2001},
  address={Edinburgh},
  booktitle={Workshop Developmental Embodied Cognition},
  note={This is the short version of the paper: On the Relevance of Language Evolution Models for Cognitive Science},
  url={http://www.isrl.uiuc.edu/~amag/langev/paper/zuidema01towardsFormal.html}
}

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