tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post603377775387196426..comments2024-02-12T02:22:30.561-05:00Comments on The Lousy Linguist: ant synonyms and linguistics envyChrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-36937965075072665872017-04-11T09:03:48.844-04:002017-04-11T09:03:48.844-04:00Actually phonemes can be better defined as a set o...Actually phonemes can be better defined as a set of distinctive traces which enable a finite number of meaningful qualities to emerge from the continuous variation of sound<br />In other words, for any language there is a finite set of yes/no questions (is your tongue touching the roof of your mouth? are your vocal folds vibrating? etc)that actually matter in determining what sounds are considered distinct from each other, so any variation that does not change the answer to one of these "meaningful questions" won't cause a change in meaning<br />In this way, it does make sense to say there's not a disctinctive variation when an atom changes place but the ants don't change their reaction, but i think we can't really say there are actual "for real" phonemes until we find a finite set of distinctions ("does it have either x, y or z chain lenght?" "does it have a methyl group located in carbon [either a, b or c]?") that would enable one to tell the reaction elicited by a certain chemical based on specific molecular characteristics, all the rest (those not pertaining to these "questions") being irrelevant to determining responseDasragonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07427643552942746567noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-23548216702857157892010-08-18T11:25:14.076-04:002010-08-18T11:25:14.076-04:00Another way to think about this is optionality. J...Another way to think about this is <i>optionality</i>. Just as a human may choose to say 'teacher' or 'instructor' or a bilingual may choose one language over another, ants respond in the same way to different molecules (of course, ants don't 'choose' the molecules, but bear with me).<br /><br />Optionality is found at all levels of language. Perhaps a closer analogy to chemical compositions is optionality in syntax. I could say "Mary gave John a book" or "Mary gave a book to John"- slightly different orders with the same basic meaning. If I change the order too much, the meaning becomes different (e.g. John gave Mary a book).<br /><br />A related set of studies is interspecies communication where, for example, Diana Monkeys respond to alarm calls of their own species and also Campbell's Monkeys (Zuberbuhler, 2000).Sean Robertshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10866561489634450589noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-69730247211498238282010-08-13T13:58:19.969-04:002010-08-13T13:58:19.969-04:00Scott, yes, I think you're onto the right idea...Scott, yes, I think you're onto the right idea. Synonyms are structurally different, but elicit similar responses ("meanings") while phonemes are sets of structurally similar items. that rough first pass, anyway.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-5133565682939213192010-08-11T17:02:56.872-04:002010-08-11T17:02:56.872-04:00I now definitely think your phoneme interpretation...I now definitely think your phoneme interpretation of the ant research makes more sense.<br /><br />What the scientists seem to be doing is making phonemes of each other. Adding an extra methyl unit means that one of the hydrogen atoms in the molecule has been replaced by the methyl unit. You've changed one "sound" (the hydrogen atom) for another (the methyl unit), making something entirely different in the process, which the ants may or may not be able to distinguish.<br /><br />For two molecules to be synonyms, they'd have to be entirely different on a structural basis, yet still elicit generally similar responses from the ants. Teacher and instructor are words of similar meaning, but have a different number and arrangement of letters.<br /><br />If molecule A, entirely and fundamentally different from molecule B, elicits the same response from an ant as molecule B, molecules A and B are treated as synonyms. If molecule A only differs from molecule B by one very small chemical subunit, as in the ant research, and a different ant response is observed, phoneme may be the more appropriate classification.<br /><br />Glucose, fructose, etc are definitely structurally different, but they're also similar (same number of hydrogen, carbon, and oxygen atoms), so I think the phoneme vs synonym classification could go either way in that case.<br /><br />Assuming you've helped me get on the right track here, this has been very useful -- thanks! I'm linking to this whole discussion on my blog post to clear things up.<br /><br />ScottMichael Scott Longhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06792876399501417370noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-56756495656606028622010-08-11T15:48:09.715-04:002010-08-11T15:48:09.715-04:00Scott, happy to discuss this more. When thinking a...Scott, happy to discuss this more. When thinking about phonemes try not to think about words. Phonemes are best thought of as a set of sounds that are treated as one within a language. A good example from English is aspirated stops. <br /><br />Try this (I used to have my intro to linguistics students do this): Put your hand about 2 inches from you mouth and say the words <i>pit</i> and <i>spit</i> one after the other two or three times. If you're a native speaker of English you should be able to notice that the /p/ in <i>pit</i> produces a short burst of air (called aspiration) but the /p/ in <i>spit</i> does not. It turns out that English speakers aspirate voiceless stop consonants when they occur at the beginning of syllables like <i>pit</i> but not when they are syllable internal like <i>spit</i>. You should find similar results with /t/ and /k/. <br /><br />This is a variation in the physical phonetic realization of the single phoneme /p/, but we still consider both of them to be examples of /p/. Not all languages do this, btw. Hindi would consider them different.<br /><br />So we can say that English has a single /p/ phoneme with two phonetic realizations.<br /><br />Now let me step out of my comfort zone and into yours. Let's look at sugars of which there are various molecular realizations because it refers to a class of carbs including <i>sucrose</i>, <i>lactose</i> and <i>fructose</i> (thank you Wikipedia! haha). They are similar but interestingly different and they all are referred to as <i>sugars</i>. <br /><br />Off the top of my head, I don't know if sugars are better analogized as phonemes or synonyms. What do you think?Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-15990853829949094432010-08-11T14:01:41.569-04:002010-08-11T14:01:41.569-04:00I admit that I had to look up the word "phone...I admit that I had to look up the word "phoneme." I'm not a linguist, so maybe you can help me out here.<br /><br />As I understand it, two words are synonyms if they have very similar yet sometimes distinguishable meanings, and a phoneme is the smallest unit of speech that distinguishes one word from another.<br /><br />If my definitions are right, then the chemicals in the ant research could be classified as either synonyms or phonemes, depending on the chemical (and the phoneme results are possibly more interesting than the synonym results).<br /><br />For different chemicals that elicit a different ant aggression response, the difference between the chemicals is the phoneme.<br /><br />For different chemicals that elicit the same ant aggression response, the chemicals are synonyms (they could one day elicit different responses because the chemicals are in fact slightly different).<br /><br />Am I off-base here? I appreciate the chance to sort out issues like this with people who clearly know a lot more about a topic than I do, and I always like commentary on my blog posts.<br /><br />ScottMichael Scott Longhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06792876399501417370noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-34336777711697175802010-08-11T12:09:05.709-04:002010-08-11T12:09:05.709-04:00Scott, thanks for the thoughtful response. I certa...Scott, thanks for the thoughtful response. I certainly didn't mean any critique of your post. I enjoyed it. It just sparked a thought about what a synonym really is and why they're interesting. I do think the phoneme analogy might be more accurate for the ant behavior the study reviewed. And I'd be interested to find out more about what sort of cognitive processing may or may not be involved. Again, I know nothing about ants and little about chemistry.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-75779084416572015762010-08-11T11:36:47.116-04:002010-08-11T11:36:47.116-04:00I never meant to imply that ants communicate on a ...I never meant to imply that ants communicate on a level comparable to humans.<br /><br />On the other hand, your main point that I was fast and loose with the term "synonym" bears consideration. In my defense, however, in the text of my post, I did put "chemical synonyms" in quotes. Again, your thoughts have given me something to think about.<br /><br />My posts often talk about things like "synthetic cells" and "synthetic genomes," but I always try to be careful to explain how they're nowhere near as complex as a real cell or a real genome.<br /><br />Incidentally, ants can solve problems, and honeybees have a limited sense of numbers, suggesting that their cognitive abilities may be under-appreciated.<br /><br />ScottMichael Scott Longhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06792876399501417370noreply@blogger.com