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Sesquipedalian #27
the SESQUIPEDALIAN Volume VII, No. 27
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'Let it Be' released (1970) May 8, 1997
-/-\-/ LOOK WHO'S TALKING /-\-/-
-- Scott Schwenter will be giving a practice job talk on Monday, May
12 at 2:15 in MJH 146. You are all invited to attend. Your comments
and feedback will be greatly appreciated; this is a practice talk
for a campus interview at Southern Illinois University later next
week. The title of the talk is "Exclusivity and the pragmatics of
conditional marking."
-- FELLOWSHIPS: Julie Solomon has been awarded a Whiting Fellowship,
which includes a three-quarter stipend. Also, Qing Zhang has been
awarded a GRO grant to pursue her sociolinguistic fieldwork in China.
-/-\-/ LINGUISTICS COLLOQUIUM /-\-/-
Friday, May 9, 3:30pm
Margaret Jacks Hall (460), Room 146
Michael Maratsos
University of Minnesota
Can Grammar Make You Feel Different?
The Whorfian hypothesis has not fared very well in the highly
concrete realm of colors. But it might be expected to fare better in
"fuzzier" conceptual areas like cognitions about emotional experience.
We conducted a study of speakers' ratings of how much control experiencers
have over emotions and emotional situations, including ratings from
English, Italian, and Greek speakers. On the whole, the grammar of
"basic" two-argument emotion relation verbs is the same across these
languages (subject=experiencer, direct object = stimulus). But for
a few basic emotional concepts, particularly those corresponding to 'like'
and 'miss,' the grammar of Greek and Italian treat the experiencer as a
kind of oblique object, and the stimulus as the subject, perhaps
translatable as 'he likes to me' or 'he pleases to me.' Since
transitive-grammatical-subject is generally thought to have an agentive
semantic core-prototype, one might think these non-subject experiencers
for 'like' and 'miss' would be influenced in non-agentive directions by
the grammar, for Italian and Greek speakers, compared to English speakers.
The fact that most other transitive experiencers are encoded by transitive
subjects in all three languages makes it possible to control for possible
general cultural differences in making the comparisons. We also looked at
other kinds of cultural, non-grammatically based differences between the
speakers of the different languages. (Results to be discussed at talk).
------------------
Reception follows.
For directions and a complete list of colloquia, see
http://www-linguistics.stanford.edu/Linguistics/colloq/colloq.html
-/-\-/ PHONOLOGY WORKSHOP /-\-/-
Rm 146, Bldg 460
Thursday 5/8/97, 7:30 pm
Orhan Orgun
University of California at Davis
Bracket Erasure effects in a declarative grammar
Whether there are limits on the amount of morphological information
that phonology is allowed to access, and, if so, what the limits are,
has been the topic of much debate in the past decades.
The observation that information from inner cycles is not
accessed by the phonology of outer cycles (Siegel 1974, 1978, Allen
1978) formed one of the original motivations for the subsequent
framework of Lexical Phonology (Pesetsky 1979, Kiparsky 1982a, Mohanan
1982, 1986). Within the recently popular movement toward noncyclic
phonological analyses, however, the issue of limiting phonological
access to internal morphological structure has received little
attention.
This paper takes up the important issue of Bracket Erasure
effects from the perspective of Sign-Based Morphology, a declarative,
nonderivational theory of the phonology-morphology interface
introduced by Orgun 1994a. Sign-Based Morphology makes the novel, and
correct, prediction that phonology and morphology will exhibit
different degrees of sensitivity to internal morphological
structure. Phonology may access only the immediate constituents of the
node it is applying to, while morphology can indirectly refer to
information about the "granddaughters" of the top node (that is, to
the immediate constituents of the immediate constituents of the top
node).
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All are welcome for pre-workshop pizza (7:00 pm). If you want to join,
repondez s'il vous plait. Thanks.
-/-\-/ SYMBOLIC SYSTEMS FORUM /-\-/-
"Action: Theory, Logic, and Application"
David Israel
SRI International
Thursday, 8 May, 4:15pm
Margaret Jacks Hall 146
Abstract
Action: Theory, Logic, and Application
John Perry and Syun Tutiya (of Chiba University, Japan) and I have
developed a theory of the structure of action inspired in part by the
relational theory of meaning developed in Barwise and Perry
"Situations and Attitudes". It can also be seen as inspired by a large
body of work in Computer Science on the semantics of programs. That
latter body of work in turn has led to two major streams of work in
logic of programs: action-oriented logics (such as Pratt's Dynamic
Logic) and temporal logics of programs. We have explored both
action-oriented and temporal logics; more recently we adapted a
"hybrid" approach, due originally to Rohit Parikh in the late '70s.
In this talk, I will sketch the theory, briefly describe a logic or
two and discuss a field of applications, conceptions of disability and
handicap, that is central to the Archimedes Project at CSLI.
Biography
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
David Israel is a Senior Computer Scientist in the Artificial
Intelligence Laboratory at SRI International and a Senior Research
Associate at CSLI.
-\-/-\ SYMBOLIC SYSTEMS DISTINGUISHED SPEAKER LECTURE \-/-\-
The Symbolic Systems Student Society Presents
The 1997 Distinguished Speaker Event
"Post Symbolic Systems"
by Jaron Lanier
Annenberg Auditorium
15 May, 1997
4:00pm-6:00pm
Biography of Speaker:
--------------------
Jaron Lanier is a computer scientist, composer, visual artist, and author.
Lanier is probably best known for his work in Virtual
Reality. He coined the term 'Virtual Reality', and founded the VR
industry. He started the first VR company, VPL Research, Inc., which
produced most of the world's VR equipment for many years. He is the
co-inventor of fundamental VR components such as interface gloves and
VR networking.
Lanier was also the first to propose and implement a variety
of technologies that have since spawned industries in their own
right. Among his lineup of "firsts" are the first "avatar" for network
communications, the first moving camera virtual set for television
production, and the first performance animation for 3D computer
graphics. He was the first to propose web-based network
computers. Along with Dr. Joe Rosen and Scott Fisher he initiated the
fields of real-time endoscopic surgical simulation and telesurgery. As
a computer scientist, Lanier is also known as a pioneer in the field
of visual programming.
Music is Lanier's first love and he has been an active
composer and performer in the world of new classical music since the
late seventies. He is also a pianist and a specialist in unusual
musical instruments, especially the wind and string instruments of
Asia. Lanier has performed with artists as diverse as Philip Glass,
Ornette Coleman, Vernon Reid, Terry Riley, Barbara Higbie, and Stanley
Jordan. He also writes chamber and orchestral music. His record
"Instruments of Change" was released on Point/Polygram in 1994. In the
works are a new album of chamber music for Sony Classics, an
orchestral commission for the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and a
Ballet, "The Thinning of the Veil".
Lanier's paintings and drawings have been exhibited in
galleries in the United States and Europe and in the Internet. In 1994
he directed the film "Muzork" under a commission from ARTE
Television. His 1983 "Moondust" is generally regarded as the first art
video game, and the first interactive music publication. In 1996 he
presented the "Video Feedback Waterbed", a large installation at Exit
Art in New York City. Lanier's best known visual art, however, is his
work in the design of virtual worlds, including "The Sound of One
Hand", and many others.
Lanier is also a well known author and speaker. He writes on
numerous topics, including the philosophy of consciousness, internet
politics, and the future of humanism in a technological world. He is a
founding contributing writer for Wired Magazine, and was the guest
editor of a special issue of the magazine SPIN devoted to the future
(November 1995). He appears on national television regularly, on
shows such as "Nightline" and "Charlie Rose", has been profiled in
many prominent publications, such as the Wall Street Journal, and has
had his original research featured on the cover of Scientific American
twice.
Abstract of Talk
----------------
Virtual Reality has lead me to explore some of the extremes of what
might be possible in both natural languages and programming languages, and
these two explorations have influenced each other in surprising ways.
I originally became involved with VR in the hopes of improving user
interfaces for large and complex computer programming tasks. In the course
of this work, I became convinced that advanced user interfaces would
influence the core as well as the surface of programming language design.
Some of the most entrenched ideas about computer programming languages
might be understood better as mnemonic devices to help users cope with
text-based or text-influenced user interfaces. I have explored this
possibility by designing a series of user interface-intensive programming
languages that reject seemingly ubiquitous ideas like parsers and source
code.
I also started to wonder about the role of symbols and abstraction
in natural language. I have postulated a new type of natural
communication, as a thought experiment, that might be at least
theoretically possible at some time in the future. There would be
excellent modeling and programming tools for networked VR in this future,
and a community of people highly skilled in the fast construction of shared
virtual worlds. Members of this community could hypothetically communicate
by creating rapidly changing content in a shared, objective world. They
would create and share content directly, instead of referring to
contingencies indirectly with words or other symbolic devices. This is
what I call post-symbolic communication.
While it might at first seem that symbols, abstractions, and
categories would be needed to communicate anything substantial, even in
this future, that does not appear to be the case. For just one example,
instead of abstract categories or platonic ideals, it might be possible to
create a concrete, but very large, collection of objects that are to be
considered as similar. Such a collection could be held inside a virtual
jar, for instance, that is small on the outside but big inside, and could
be available as conveniently as a word.
Another way to say this is that concreteness could be as versatile
as abstraction, if it becomes very easy to make and change concrete things.
If it is at least possible that our understanding of the range of
potential natural languages has been limited by assumptions based on text,
it is certainly worth re-examining our assumptions about computer
languages.
-\-/-\ JOB ANNOUNCEMENTS \-/-\-
(REDUNDANCY NOTICE: For fuller listings of these and other jobs, don't
forget to check the Jobs binder in the Greenberg Room, and the file
'jobslist.txt' on the CSLI directory /user/linguistics.)
-- ORACLE: Oracle Corporation, Redwood Shores, CA. Product
Development position available immediately. CONTACT PERSON: Veronique
Anxolabehere (vanxolab@us.oracle.com, (415) 506-4056) Qualifications:
DEGREE/MAJOR: B.S. in Linguistics, Psychology, Philosophy or
Artificial Intelligence YRS EXPERIENCE: 1-5
OTHER:
- Candidate must be a native Japanese speaker and fluent in English
- Must have deep interest in language and cognitive science
- Fluency in French, Dutch and/or German preferred
- Good written communication skills are a must
- Creative writing experience preferred
- Ability to focus creative attention on complex problems
- Familiarity with UNIX, C, SQL preferred
RESPONSIBILITIES
- Maintenance of Japanese lexicon and knowledge base
- Development of multi/interlingual lexicons
- Development of automated linguistic tools
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Veronique Anxolabehere Oracle Corporation
ConText Globalization Manager 500 Oracle Parkway
ConText Group Mail Stop 5op10
e-mail vanxolab@us.oracle.com Redwood Shores, CA 94065
Voice +1 (415) 506-4056 Fax +1 (415) 633-1361
(REDUNDANCY NOTICE: For fuller listings of these and other jobs, don't
forget to check the Jobs binder in the Greenberg Room, and the file
'jobslist.txt' on the CSLI directory /user/linguistics.)
-\-/-\ INSTA-PRIZE \-/-\-
Kyle is out of the office today so no insta-prize this week.
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