From owner-cse575-fa08-list@LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU Thu Sep 25 11:52:11 2008 Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2008 11:49:24 -0400 From: "William J. Rapaport" Subject: UB CogSci 10/1 P.M.Pietroski "Meanings-What Are They Good For?" To: CSE575-FA08-LIST@LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU ======================================================================== NEXT WEEK NEXT WEEK NEXT WEEK NEXT WEEK NEXT WEEK NEXT WEEK ======================================================================== Center for Cognitive Science, University at Buffalo presents ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Paul M. Pietroski Departments of Linguistics and Philosophy http://www.ling.umd.edu/pietroski/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Wednesday, 1 October 2008; 2:00 p.m.; Park 280 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Meanings: What Are They, and What Are They Good For? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Abstract: In this talk, I'll offer a version of the old idea that meanings are instructions to build concepts. The proposal draws on work by Frege and Chomsky, along with many other philosophers and linguists. Frege showed us how expressions of an invented language (used by scientists) might be viewed as "recipes" for constructing concepts, including formally new "atomic" concepts that can be introduced by means of fruitful definitions. Chomsky showed us how expressions of a natural language (acquirable by children) might be viewed as outputs of an instantiated procedure for generating instructions to cognitive systems that "interface with" the human language faculty. We can use Chomsky's notion of an I-language to describe a corresponding notion of an I-concept: a concept that can be constructed by executing the semantic instruction provided by an expression of an I-language. Then we can say that the meaning of an I-language expression is an instruction to create an I-concept. As we'll see, this general idea is compatible with various views about lexicalization and the significance of combining words to form phrases. But given some empirically motivated assumptions about the significance of combining words, there are some interesting consequences for lexicalization. Many contemporary researchers adopt, at least as an idealization, an old picture of lexicalizing as a cognitively conservative process of labeling a concept with some grammatical information. But if meanings are instructions to construct I-concepts, we probably need a neo-Fregean model according to which lexicalization can be a cognitively creative process of abstraction, in which already existing concepts (that humans may well share with other animals) are paired with analytically related I-concepts that may be formally new. >From this perspective, meanings and I-languages may have more to do with reorganizing conceptual space--and less to do with communication--than many current theories suggest. Background reading: Pietroski, Paul M. (2008), "Semantic Monadicity with Conceptual Polyadicity" https://ublearns.buffalo.edu/@@9D9FE4292DB23640AEEE18C472FD0792/courses/1/ADM_PSY_MAUNER_081508/content/_1042845_1/PietroskiHandbookChapter.pdf ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Complete Fall schedule @ www.cogsci.buffalo.edu/Activities/Colloquium/CLLQf08/2008fall.html Background readings for each lecture are available to UB faculty and students on UB Learns. Once you have logged in to UB Learns at https://ublearns.buffalo.edu/ select "Center for Cognitive Science", then "Course Documents", then "Background Readings for Fall 2008 Colloquium Series". Or link directly to: https://ublearns.buffalo.edu/webapps/blackboard/content/listContent.jsp?course_id=_60597_1&content_id=_1010420_1 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ For further information, please visit: http://www.cogsci.buffalo.edu/ or contact: William J. Rapaport Webmaster, Center for Cognitive Science Associate Professor of Computer Science Affiliated Faculty, Philosophy & Linguistics 201 Bell Hall | (716) 645-3180 x 112 Dept. of Computer Science & Engineering | fax: (716) 645-3464 University at Buffalo (SUNY) | rapaport@cse.buffalo.edu Buffalo, NY 14260-2000 | http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~rapaport Buffalo Restaurant Guide: http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/restaurant.guide/ Good Things about Buffalo: http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~rapaport/buffalo.html