Linguagem, Cognição e Evolução
PUCRS
Metateoria das Interfaces
Interfaces Externas (IE) - Interdisciplinares
Interfaces Internas (II) - Intradisciplinares
Ex.:
IE – Lingüística e Psicologia Cognitiva
Lingüística e Lógica Clássica
Lingüística e Comunicação Social
II -
Fonologia – Morfologia - Lexicologia
Sintaxe – Semântica - Pragmática
Lingüística e Cognição
Chomsky – Gerativismo/Biolingüística
A faculdade da linguagem está enraizada
no cérebro/mente humano numa Gramática
Universal de base inata.
Lingüística e Psicologia Evolucionária A Evolução da Linguagem
Darwinismo e Seleção Natural
Dawkins e Gene Egoísta
Pinker e Jackendoff – Adaptação
Chomsky e Gould – Exaptação
Lingüística e Psicologia Evolucionária
Lingüística Evolucionária
Darwinismo e Seleção Natural
Pinker and Bloom, 1990; Hauser,
Chomsky, and Fitch, 2002;
Lingüística e Ciências
Cognitivas
Linguagem e Cérebro
Lingüística Evolucionária
• Hauser, Chomsky e Fitch (The Faculty of Language: What Is It, Who Has It, and How Did It Evolve?
Faculdade da Linguagem (FL) - propriedade Do cérebro/mente
FLB ( broad) / FLN (narrow)
A investigação da FL deve ser interdisciplinar
We argue that an understanding of the faculty of language requires substantial interdisciplinary cooperation. We suggest how current
developments in linguistics can
be profitably wedded to work in evolutionary biology, anthropology, psychology, and
neuroscience. We submit that a distinction should be made between the faculty of language in the broad sense (FLB)and in the narrow sense (FLN).
Hauser, Chomsky e Fitch
FLB: sistema sensório-motor Sistema conceptual-intencional Mecanismos computacionais FLN: sistema recursivoFLB includes a sensory-motor system, a conceptual-intentional system, and the computational mechanisms for recursion,
providing the capacity to generate an infinite range of
expressions from a finite set of elements. We hypothesize that FLN only includes recursion and is the only uniquely human component of the faculty of language. We further argue that FLN may have evolved for reasons other than language, hence comparative studies might look for evidence of such
computations outside of the domain of communication (for example, number, navigation, and social relations).
Hauser, Chomsky e Fitch
Se marciamos observassem:
código universal no DNA /
genes geram variações ilimitadas de
espécies - humanas e outras
Ao contrário,
não parece haver códigos universais de
comunicação – línguas humanas são
gerativas, recursivas, criativas, ilimitadas
hierárquicas, muito diferentemente de
Hauser, Chomsky e Fitch
A propriedade recursiva é própria da
linguagem humana e o centro
computa-cional da cognição.(FLN) é o único fator
diferencial homem-animal.
1 é N
Se a está em N, então a+1 está em N
Se a+1 está em N, então a+1+1 também
João viu Maria, que é irmã de Luís, que
conhece Pedro, que gosta de Lúcia, que
foi para Porto Alegre, que é a capital...
Hauser, Chomsky e Fitch
Se marcianos observassem:
vendo as variações ilimitadas de
códi-gos comunicativos incompreensíveis
entre si – quereriam saber como os
hu-nos desenvolveram a linguagem.
A evolução da linguagem humana
pode-ria distinguir
fatores computacionais
de
fatores comunicativos
: os primeiros
po-deriam se desenvolver
independente-mente dos segundo que mais tarde viriam a
se mostrar importantes.
Três Fatores Distintos na Evolução
1 Compartilhado versus único 2 Gradual versus saltacional 3 Contínuo versus exaptativo
Não há consenso - noção de linguagem Línguagem E – conceito sócio-cultural Linguagem I – conceito cognitivo
• In informal usage, a language is understood as a culturally specific communication system (English, Navajo, etc.). In the varieties of modern linguistics that concern us here, the term ―language‖ is used quite differently to refer to an internal component
• of the mind/brain (sometimes called ―internal
• language‖ or ―I-language‖). We assume that this is the primary object of interest for the study of the evolution and function of the language faculty.
The faculty of language: what’s
special about it?*
Steven Pinker and Ray Jackendoff (PJ)
PJ consideram problemática a hipótese de HCF sobre a recursão(HRO) como aspecto unicamente humano e unicamente para a linguagem.
It ignores the many aspects of grammar that are not recursive, such as phonology, morphology,
case, agreement, and many properties of words. It is inconsistent with the anatomy and neural control of the human vocal tract. And it is weakened by
experiments suggesting that speech perception cannot be reduced to primate audition, that word learning cannot be reduced to fact learning, and that at least one gene involved in speech and
language was evolutionarily selected in the human lineage but is not specific to recursion. (PJ)
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
PJ rejeitam a hipótese de que a
lingua-gem não seja uma adaptação, que ela
seja perfeita, não-redundante, não
ne-cessariamente usável, e mal desenhada
para a comunicação.
•
―The hypothesis that language is a
complex adaptation for communication
which evolved piecemeal avoids all
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
•
―The most fundamental question in the
study of the human language faculty is its
place in the natural world: what kind of
biological system it is, and how it relates to
other systems in our own species and
others‖
1 O que é aprendido do ambiente
2 O que vem com o desenho do cérebro
3 Que partes são específicas da
lingua-quais são gerais
4 Que aspectos são só humanos e quais
são compartilhados com outro animais.
A HRU anula a proposta de adaptação da linguagem para a comunicação
defendida por PJ.
As HCF note (p. 1572), the two of us have advanced a position rather different from theirs, namely that the language faculty, like other biological systems
showing signs of complex adaptive design (Dawkins, 1986; Williams, 1966), is a system
of co-adapted traits that evolved by natural selection (Jackendoff, 1992, 1994, 2002;
Pinker, 1994b, 2003; Pinker & Bloom, 1990). Specifically, the language faculty evolved in
the human lineage for the communication of complex propositions.
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
PJ enfraquecem a HRU:
Conceptual structure: HCF plausibly suggest that human conceptual structure partly
overlaps with that of other primates and partly incorporates newly evolved capacities.
Speech perception. HCF suggest it is simply generic primate auditory perception. But
the tasks given to monkeys are not comparable to the feats of human speech perception,
and most of Liberman’s evidence for the Speech-is-Special hypothesis, and more recent
experimental demonstrations of human–monkey differences in speech perception, are
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
• Speech production. HCF’s recursion-only hypothesis implies no selection forspeech
production in the human lineage. But control of the supralaryngeal vocaltract is incomparably more
complex in human language than in other primate vocalizations. Vocal imitation and vocal learning
are uniquely human among primates (talents that are consistently manifested only in speech). And syllabic babbling emerges spontaneously in human infants. HCF further suggest that the distinctively human anatomy of the vocal tract may have been selected for size exaggeration rather than speech. Yet the evidence for the former in humans is weak, and does not account for the distinctive anatomy of the supralaryngeal parts of the vocal tract.
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
• Phonology. Not discussed by HCF. Lexicon. HCF discuss two ways in which words are a distincti-vely human ability, possibly unique to our species.
But they assign words to the broad language
faculty, which is shared by other human cognitive faculties, without discussing the ways in which words appear to be tailored to language—namely
that they consist in part (sometimes in large part) of grammatical information, and that they are
bidirectional, shared, organized, and generic in reference, features that are experimental
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
Morphology: Not discussed by HCF.†
Syntax: Case, agreement, pronouns,
predicate-argument structure, topic, focus,
auxiliaries, question markers, and so on,
are not discussed by HCF. Recursion is said
to be human-specific, but no distinction is
made between arbitrary recursive
mathematical systems and the particular
kinds of recursive phrase structure found in
human languages. We conclude that the
empirical case for the recursion-only
hypothesis is extremely weak.
•
S. Pinker, R. Jackendoff / Cognition 95
(2005) 201–236 217
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
1 Alguns dos fundamentos do sistema
conceptual-intencional estão presentes
em outros animais(espaciais, causais,..)
Há sistemas que dependem da
lingua-gem, o conceito de semana e outros.
2 A percepção da fala humana é
espe-cial (SiS H), diferente de primatas,
ten-do siten-do adaptações para intenções
arti-culatórias humanas.
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
PJ trazem muitas evidências de que há
mais aspectos da evolução do que HCF
Defendem:
1 Fala e som são fenômenos diferentes
2 Neuroimagem e desordens mostram
diferentes áreas envolvidas em fala e
sons
3 Crianças recém-nascidos distinguem
fala de sons semelhantes
4 Animais-primatas não são
competen-tes para a distinção de sons da fala
The nature of the language faculty and its implications for evolution of language (Reply to Fitch, Hauser, and Chomsky)*
Ray Jackendoff, Steven Pinker
• In a continuation of the conversation with Fitch, Chomsky, and Hauser on the evolution of language, we examine their defense of the claim that the
uniquely human, language-specific part of the
language faculty (the ―narrow language faculty‖) consists only of recursion, and that this part
cannot be considered an adaptation to communication. We argue that their
characterization of the narrow language faculty is problematic for many reasons, including its
dichotomization of cognitive capacities into those that are utterly unique and those that are identical to nonlinguistic or nonhuman capacities, omitting capacities that may have been substantially
Evolução da Linguagem (Pinker and Jackendoff)
• We also question their dichotomy of the current utility versus original function of a trait, which omits traits that are adaptations for current use, and their dichotomy of humans and animals, which conflates similarity due to common function and
similarity due to inheritance from a recent common ancestor. We show that recursion, though absent from other animals’ communications systems, is found in visual cognition, hence cannot be the sole evolutionary development that granted language to humans. Finally, we note that despite Fitch et al.’s denial, their view of language evolution is tied to Chomsky’s conception of language itself, which
identifies combinatorial productivity with a core of ―narrow syntax.‖
