Models of Language Evolution Vertical Transmission Session 11: - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Roland Mühlenbernd Overview Biological VS Cultural Constraints Horizontal VS Models of Language Evolution Vertical Transmission Session 11: Students Presentations Part III Roland Mühlenbernd 2015/01/21

Overview Roland Mühlenbernd Overview date speaker literature / project topic Biological VS Cultural Constraints 7.1 Kameliya Hristova Culture: Copying, Compression, and Conventionality (Tamariz, Kirby 2014) Franziska Koesling Horizontal VS Talking to Neighbors: The Evolution of Regional Meaning (Zollman 2005) Vertical 14.1 Carina Rüdinger Social Language Learning (Steels 2003) Transmission Patrick Zahn Modelling the Cultural Evolution of Language (Steels 2011) Vanessa Nadler Signalling Games: Evolutionary Convergence on Optimality (Lentz, Blutner 2009) 21.1 Larissa Meier Language Structure: Psychological and Social Constraints (Jäger, van Roiij 2007) Clara Baumgärtner Integrating the Horizontal & Vertical Cultural Transmission of Novel Communication Systems (Theisen-White, Kirby, Oberlander 2014) Marcel Binz project topic: signaling & the game of life (Mühlenbernd, Schulz 2014) 28.1 Sabrina Selck project topic: evolution of the lexicon (Steels 1995) Daniel Schuhmacher project topic: communication & changing interaction structure Pink Powerangers project topic: evolution of recursive compositionality 4.2 Vivian Fresen project topic: evolution of human vowel systems (de Boer 2002) Team 1 project topic: evolution of compositionality in signaling games Team Nash project topic: evolution of semantic variation (Zollman 2005)

Three Adaptive Systems of Language Evolution Roland Mühlenbernd Overview Biological VS Cultural Constraints Horizontal VS Vertical Transmission 3 adaptive systems in language evolution (Kirby & Hurford 2002) Two important contrapositions: 1. biological vs cultural constraints (biolinguists vs evolutionary linguists) 2. horizontal vs vertical transmission (population vs learning dynamics)

Biological VS Cultural Constraints Roland Mühlenbernd The nature of human (non-)linguistic color categories (research field for more than 50 years) Overview Biological VS Cultural Constraints ◮ do color terminologies evolve naturally to an optimum point for Horizontal VS communicative and descriptive purposes? (cultural constraints) Vertical Transmission ◮ are color terminologies determined by perceptive and cognitive constraints? (biological constraints) ◮ how are linguistic usage/representation and cognitive/perceptive sensation of colors interrelated?

Basic Color Term Evolution Roland Mühlenbernd Properties of human languages Overview ◮ the number of basic color terms is between 2 and 11(12). Biological VS ◮ if a language has 11 basic color terms, then the encoded Cultural Constraints Horizontal VS categories are: Vertical Transmission WHITE, BLACK, RED, GREEN, YELLOW, BLUE, BROWN, ORANGE, PINK, PURPLE, and GREY ◮ languages with 11 (12) basic color terms: Arabic (Lebanese), Bulgarian, English, German, Hebrew, Hungarian (12!), Japanese, Korean, Russian (12!), Spanish, Zuni, ... ◮ if a language has fewer than 11 basic color terms, then there are strict limitations on which categories it may encode: ◮ only 22 different color vocabularies ◮ can be described by 7 implicative universals ◮ form almost always a partition of the whole space

Example: Basic Color Term Evolution Roland Mühlenbernd Overview Biological VS Cultural Constraints Horizontal VS Vertical From: Color Appearance and the Emergence and Evolution of Basic Color Lexicons (Kay, Maffi 1999) Transmission Popular partitions emerge from three basic rules 1. Distinguish Black and White 2. Distinguish warm (red & yellow) from cold primaries (green & blue) 3. Distinguish red

Horizontal VS Vertical Transmission Roland Mühlenbernd 1. Horizontal transmission: language evolves by Overview exchange/communication in one population (generation) Biological VS Cultural Constraints 2. Vertical transmission: language evolves by Horizontal VS Vertical teaching/learning from one generation to the next one Transmission In what way differ and resemble types of linguistic change caused by horizontal and vertical transmission? From: Scott-Phillips and Kirby: Language Evolution in the Lab (2010)

Studies of Today Roland Mühlenbernd 1. Larissa Meier Overview ◮ Topic: Language Structure: Psychological & Social Constraints Biological VS (Jäger, van Roiij 2007) Cultural Constraints ◮ Background: Evolution of Basic Color Lexicon Horizontal VS Vertical ◮ Category: computational study of evolutionary dynamics Transmission 2. Clara Baumgärtner ◮ Topics: Cultural emergence of combinatorial structure in an artificial whistled language (Verhoef, Kirby, Padden 2014) & Integrating the Horizontal & Vertical Cultural Transmis. of Novel Communic. Systems (Theisen-White, Kirby, Oberlander 2014) ◮ Background: Language Evolution in the Laboratory ◮ Category: experimental studies of horizontal & vertical transmission 3. Marcel Binz ◮ Topic: The Game of Life (Conway, 1970) ◮ Background: Conway’s Game of Life, Signaling, Neuronal Networks ◮ Category: computational study of spatial/population dynamics