Chomsky's Notion Of A Language Acquisition Device Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 242-3):

All of this is by way of introducing the problem of how thought and language are connected. A clear picture must be drawn of the relation between concept systems and language. Does the mastery of language depend on the existence of a rich and embodied concept system? Or is language mastery more or less autonomous, developing by means of a language acquisition device? 

One of the most pervasive and influential approaches to these critical questions was pioneered by Chomsky. In his formal systems approach, the principal assumption is that the rules of syntax are independent of semantics. Language, in this view, is independent of the rest of cognition. I must take issue with this notion.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, thoughts are the meanings of language projected by the cognitive mental processes of consciousness.

As previously explained, Edelman's 'concept systems' are perceptual meanings organised into systems of relations. In the ontogenesis of linguistic systems, perceptual meanings are identified with concrete experiential linguistic meanings, such that the identity encodes linguistic values by reference to perceptual tokens.

On this view, a biological language acquisition device is, prototypically, a socially-embedded human being.

Intentionality And Referral Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 238):

With the homunculus, we come to one of the great problems in considering the matter of the mind: the problem of accounting for intentionality itself. We have already shown that formal semantics cannot refer unambiguously to real states of affairs. But many of the causal aspects of our mental states depend on semantic contents. As Searle has stressed, semantic contents are meaningless without intentionality or the ability to refer to other states or objects. To carry out referral, a formal representation must become an intentional one. In human beings, this requires a consciousness and a self — a biologically based personal awareness, a first person. No theory of mind worth its salt can evade this issue, which is not only a matter of language but also a great biological problem.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, 'real states of affairs' are meanings that are construed of experience of the non-semiotic domain by the processes of consciousness (the mental-verbal domain).

On this view, 'referral' involves the correlation (identification) of meanings of perceptual systems with meanings of language, such that perceptual tokens realise linguistic values.  This identity encodes linguistic values by reference to perceptual tokens (in ontogenesis) and decodes perceptual tokens by reference to linguistic values (in logogenesis).

Memory Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 238):

Memory is a system property: It differs depending on the structure of the system in which it is expressed. In biological systems, memory must not be confused with the mechanisms that are necessary for its establishment, such as synaptic change. Above all, biological memory is not a replica or a trace that is coded to represent its object. 

In whatever form, human memory involves an apparently open-ended set of connections between subjects and a rich texture of previous knowledge that cannot be adequately represented by the impoverished language of computer science — "storage," "retrieval," "input," "output." To have memory, one must be able to repeat a performance, to assert, to relate matters and categories to one's own position in time and space. To do this, one must have a self, and a conscious self at that.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, memory, as the ability to repeat a performance, includes the ability to instantiate meaning potential as meaning.  In this sense, semiotic systems can be understood as the expansion of memory:

• the elaboration of memory through more delicate distinctions,
• the extension of memory through conjunct and disjunct relations, and
• the enhancement of memory through the conditions on which distinctions, conjunctions and disjunctions are projected through the processes of consciousness,

with language as the most expansive form.

Objectivism Through Systemic Functional Linguistics [3]

Edelman (1992: 237):

Objects in the world are not labelled with dimensions or codes, and the way they are partitioned differs from person to person and from time to time…the mind is not a mirror of nature. Thought is not the manipulation of abstract symbols whose semantics are justified by unambiguous reference to things in the world. Classical categories do not serve in most cases of conceptual categorisation and they do not satisfactorily account for the actual assignment of categories by human beings. There is no unambiguous mapping between the world and our categorisation of it. Objectivism fails.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, all meaning is within semiotic systems.  The non-semiotic domain of experience is meaningless in itself, but is transformed into the meaning of semiotic systems, such as 'objects' of the material-relational domain, by processes of consciousness (the mental-verbal domain of meaning).  This is the sense in which:

• the non-semiotic domain ("objects in the world") has no meaning ('dimensions or codes'), 
• the mental-verbal domain ('the mind') is not a mirror of the non-semiotic domain ("nature"),
• the non-semiotic domain ("things in the world") is not referenced by the mental-verbal domain ('thought'), and
• there is no unambiguous mapping between the non-semiotic domain ("the world") and the semiotic domain ('our categorisation of it').

Objectivism is falsified by Quantum Physics, which demonstrates that the non-semiotic domain only becomes construed as meaning (e.g. as particles) through the conscious processes of an observer.

Science As "Extensional" Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 233):

The subsequent development of the computer…reinforced the ideas of efficiency and rigour and the deductive flavour that had already characterised much of physical science. The "neat" deductive formal background of computers, the link with mathematical physics, and the success of the hard sciences looked endlessly extensible. There was a natural tendency to stop a philosophical analysis of scientific exploration at the surface of the human body (the skin and its receptors). Behaviour could be analysed, but not phenomenal experience. In this way, science could remain "extensional," as W. V. Quine put it, and one could declare with him that "to be is to be a value of a variable."

Blogger Comments:

As previously noted, science is concerned with what Galileo distinguished as 'primary qualities' (as opposed to 'secondary qualities'), and what Descartes termed 'res extensa' (as opposed to 'res cogitans').  It is in this Cartesian sense that science 'could remain' "extensional".

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, this means that science is concerned with construals of experience of the non-semiotic domain as material-relational meaning (as opposed to mental-verbal meaning).  It is the mental-verbal domain of meaning that constitutes 'phenomenal experience' in this context.

Objectivism Through Systemic Functional Linguistics [2]

Edelman (1992: 230-2):

Objectivism assumes, in addition to scientific realism, that the world has a definite structure made of entities, properties, and their interrelationships. These are capable of definition according to classical criteria of categorisation that are singly necessary and jointly sufficient to define each category. The world is arranged in such a fashion that it can be completely modelled by what mathematicians and logicians would call set-theoretical models. These kinds of models, which are seen in mathematical logic, consist of symbolic entities appearing singly or in sets, together with their relationships. Symbols in these models are made meaningful (or are given semantic significance) in a unique fashion by assuming that they correspond to entities and categories in the world. Some of the categorical properties of things in the world are considered to be essential; others are seen as accidental.

Because of the singular and well-defined correspondence between set-theoretical symbols and things as defined by classical categorisation, one can, in this view, assume that logical relations between things in the world exist objectively. Thus, this system of symbols is supposed to represent reality, and mental representations must either be true or false insofar as they mirror reality correctly or incorrectly. According to objectivism, this correspondence to things in the world gives meaning to linguistic expressions; meaning is based on this "correct" or "incorrect" definition of truth and thought itself is a manipulation of symbols.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the world structured by entities, properties, and their interrelationships is meaning construed of experience of the non-semiotic domain by the processes of consciousness.

Generally, the categories of linguistic meaning are typically not categorical: that is, they do not display determinate boundaries or fixed criteria of membership (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 547).

The models of mathematicians and logicians are (theoretical) reconstruals of meanings (data) construed of experience of the non-semiotic domain by consciousness.

Scientific Realism Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 230):

Objectivism goes beyond the hypothesis of scientific realism, which itself assumes:

(1) a real world (including humans but not depending on them);
(2) a linkage between concepts and that world; and
(3) a stable knowledge that is gained through that link.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, 'the real world including humans' is the semiotic domain (meaning) construed of experience of the non-semiotic domain.  This semiotic domain depends on humans in the sense that it is construed by processes of the mental and verbal domain of meaning (human consciousness).

By the same token, 'concepts' and 'knowledge' are meaning (the semiotic domain) construed of experience of the non-semiotic domain.

The 'stability' of knowledge is the present state of meaning in its evolution as a complex adaptive system.

The Importance Of Meaning For A Theory Of Consciousness Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 224-5):

Arguments concerning semantics and meaning are important for any theory of consciousness (and thinking) that takes as its canonical reference our own phenomenal experience as humans and our ability to report that experience by language. … Human experience is not based on so simple an abstraction as a Turing machine; to get our "meanings" we have to grow and communicate in a society.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the reason that 'semantics and meaning' are important for any theory of human 'consciousness (and thinking)' is that the content of language, meaning and wording, is the content of consciousness.

That is, the phenomena that are sensed through mental processes of perception, emotion, desideration and cognition are construals of experience as meaning; the thoughts that are projected through cognitive processes and the wishes that are projected through desiderative processes are construals of experience as meaning.  By the same token, 'our ability to report that experience by language' is the ability to project the wording that realises the meaning construed of experience.

The "getting of meanings", the development of the system in the individual, its ontogenesis, occurs through logogenesis, the instantiation of the system in text.

Putnam's Notion Of 'Meaning' Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 224-5):

What is at stake here is the notion of meaning. Meaning, as Putnam puts it, "is interactional. The environment itself plays a role in determining what a speaker's words, or a community's words, refer to." Because such an environment is open-ended, it admits of no a priori inclusive description in terms of effective procedures.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, meaning is a property of semiotic systems. The 'environment' that is open-ended is the non-semiotic domain that is construed as meaning by the processes of consciousness, mental and verbal.  Wordings do not refer to the non-semiotic domain; wordings realise the meanings construed of experience of the non-semiotic domain.

The Many Worlds And Quantum Entanglement Interpretations Of Quantum Theory Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 216):

Other physicists have even proposed that there is no "collapse" of the wave function. Instead they conceive that there are "many worlds," in each one of which the function takes on a possible value alternative to the one in this world with this observer whom we see here and now. Still others have proposed a "quantum potential" that might even involve faster-than-light signalling, something that contradicts Einstein's theory of relativity!

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, Everett's 'Many Worlds' interpretation of Quantum Physics misconstrues potential (many possibilities) as actual (many worlds).  See the previous posts on Everett's 'Many Worlds' interpretation here.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, there is no faster–than–light signalling — as suggested by the notion of Quantum Entanglement and Bohm's Quantum Potential.  Two entangled photons are two related instances of the same system of quantum potential, where these are meanings of the material-relational domain construed by consciousness of experience of the non-semiotic domain.  See the previous posts on Quantum Entanglement here.

Applying The Principle Of Complementarity Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 216):

In all fairness it should be said that other distinguished physicists have interpreted the quantum measurement problem without calling the consciousness of the observer into play. Niels Bohr, the father of quantum theory, declared that there is no ultimate or deep reality; one simply applies the principle of complementarity (of which Heisenberg's principle is perhaps the most elegant expression) and then obtains the result dictated by the entire situation of measurement, particle, apparatus, and observer. Bohr's "Copenhagen interpretation" is the position taken by most physicists who use the theory. It gives a formula describing what one observes with an apparatus, one that is ultimately made up of the same kind of quantum particles one is measuring.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the following are all processes of consciousness that construe experience of the non-semiotic domain as meaning of the material-relational domain:

• applying the principle of complementarity,
• obtaining a result,
• observing, and
• measuring.

Wave-particle complementarity is the complementarity of the potential meaning that can be construed of experience, varying according to probability, and the actual instances of meaning that are construed of experience in the conscious process of observation, varying according to frequency.

Von Neumann And Wigner On The Collapse Of The Wave Function Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 214-5):

As von Neumann pointed out, the macroscopic measuring instrument is also described by a quantum mechanical wave function (practically speaking, we do not need quantum theory to describe such objects physically). He then formally showed that one cannot draw a line from the wave function of the particle all the way up to the act of the observer to establish the value of ψ at any scale. The "collapse of the wave function" is determined just when the apparatus and the particle interact to give a definite measurement. This collapse was attributed by Wigner to be the result of the intervention of the observer's consciousness. After all, the observer decides to set up the apparatus, decides whether he or she is interested in position or momentum, and actually makes the measurement! To determine the state of this apparatus in von Neumann's view, one apparatus needs another, and that one needs another one, and so on, regressing in an infinite fashion. In Wigner's scheme a phenomenon only becomes actual (that is, the regress is ended) when the observer becomes conscious of it.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, von Neumann's view on the collapse of the wave function is an attempt to understand it solely in terms of the material-relational domain of meaning, ignoring the mental-verbal domain of meaning that actually does the construing.

Wigner's view, on the other hand, takes into account both the material-relational domain of meaning (the arrangement of the apparatus) and the mental-verbal domain (the consciousness of the observer). 

Meaning of the material-relational domain only becomes actual (instantiated) when consciousness construes experience as that meaning.

The Collapse Of The Wave Function Through Systemic Functional Linguistics [3]

Edelman (1992: 215):

If one attempts to determine that position in an experimental setting, however, one loses forever the possibility of determining the momentum to the same precision. This so-called Heisenberg uncertainty is fundamental; there is a conjugate relation between the position and the momentum (the mass times the velocity) of a particle, and this relation sets the precision of the product of these variables to a value no less than Planck's constant. This is not just because to measure a particle's position precisely one must use particles or waves of much smaller wavelength and thus of higher energy, inevitably "kicking up" the particle's momentum. It is a fundamental property of the theory. In considering this relationship operationally, one begins to get a feeling for the strange flavour of quantum theory. If one (the physicist observer) chooses to measure the position of a particle to a certain precision, the act of setting up and carrying out the measurement precludes forever and irreversibly the measurement of the momentum to a similar precision. 

According to the theory, however, no bias exists before the measurement: The wave function ψ is a linear combination of functions describing all possible outcomes of the measurement, and when a measurement is made the wave function "collapses" or "projects onto" one of the possible outcomes.

Blogger Comments:

As previously explained, from the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the collapse of the wave function ψ onto one of the possible outcomes, when a measurement is made, is the process of construing experience as an instance of material-relational meaning potential.

The wave function ψ is a model of (probabilistic) quantum system potential, the meanings that can be construed of experience by consciousness.  The 'outcomes of the measurement' are (statistical) instances of that potential.