Self-organization in the evolution of speech / Pierre-Yves Oudeyer ; translated by James R. Hurford.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Oudeyer, Pierre-Yves.

Series:

Oxford linguistics

Studies in the evolution of language ; 6.

Studies in the evolution of language ; 6

Language:

English

French

Subjects (All):

Speech.

Self-organizing systems.

Language and languages--Origin.

Physical Description:

xiv, 177 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2006.

Summary:

Speech is the principal supporting medium of language. In this book Pierre-Yves Oudeyer considers how it first emerged. He presents an original and integrated view of the interactions between self-organization and natural selection, reformulates questions about the origins of speech, and puts forward what at first sight appears to be a startling proposal-that speech can be spontaneously generated by the coupling of evolutionarily simple neural structures connecting perception and production. He explores this hypothesis by constructing a computational system to model the effects of linking auditory and vocal motor neural nets. He shows that a population of agents which used holistic and unarticulated vocalizations at the outset are inexorably led to a state in which their vocalizations have become discrete, combinatorial, and categorized in the same way by all group members. Furthermore, the simple syntactic rules that have emerged to regulate the combinations of sounds exhibit the fundamental properties of modern human speech systems. This original and fascinating account will interest all those seeking to understand the evolution of speech.

Contents:

1 The Self-Organization Revolution in Science 1

1.1 Self-organization: a new light on nature 1

1.2 Language origins 6

1.2.1 Interdisciplinarity 7

1.2.2 Computer modelling 9

2 The Human Speech Code 14

2.1 The instruments of speech 14

2.2 Articulatory phonology 16

2.3 The organization of the speech code: universals 21

2.3.1 The speech code is discrete and combinatorial 22

2.3.2 The speech code is a classification system shared by the whole linguistic community 24

2.3.3 Statistical regularities in the phoneme inventories of human languages 25

2.4 The diversity of speech codes 28

2.5 Origins, development, and form 29

3 Self-Organization and Evolution 32

3.1 Self-organization 32

3.1.1 Rayleigh-Benard convection 32

3.1.2 Ferro-magnetization 35

3.2 Self-organization and natural selection 38

3.2.1 Classic neo-Darwinism 39

3.2.2 Self-organization: constraining the search space 40

3.2.3 Evolutionary explanations: function is not enough 42

3.2.4 Exaptation 48

3.3 Explaining the origin of living forms 51

4 Existing Theories 53

4.1 The reductionist approach 53

4.2 The functionalist approach 56

4.3 Operational scenarios 58

4.4 Going further 65

5 Artificial Systems as Research Tools 68

5.1 What is the scientific logic? 68

5.2 What is the point of constructing artificial systems? 70

6 The Artificial System 75

6.1 Mechanism 75

6.1.1 Assumption 1: neural units 76

6.1.2 Assumption 2: perceptuo-motor correspondences 77

6.1.3 Assumption 3: perception and plasticity 80

6.1.4 Assumption 4: production 83

6.1.5 Assumption 5: initial distribution of preferred vectors 84

6.1.6 Assumption 6: no coordinated interactions 86

6.1.7 What is not assumed 86

6.2 Dynamics 86

6.2.1 The case of uniform initial distribution 86

6.2.2 The case where the initial distribution is non-uniform 96

6.3 Categorization and acoustic illusions 97

7 Learning Perceptuo-motor Correspondences 106

7.1 The articulatory synthesizer and a model of vowel perception 111

7.2 Dynamics: predicting human vowel systems 113

8 Strong Combinatoriality and Phonotactics 123

8.1 Temporal neurons and their self-organized death 124

8.2 The dynamic formation of phonotactics and patterns of combinations 126

8.3 The impact of articulatory and energetic constraints 133

9 New Scenarios 139

9.1 Compatibility with neuroscience 140

9.2 Contribution to scenarios of the origins of speech 143

9.2.1 An adaptationist scenario: an origin linked to the evolutionary advantage of linguistic communication systems 143

9.2.2 Another adaptationist scenario, with the exaptation of discreteness, shared categorization, and combinatoriality 146

9.2.3 An exaptationist scenario in which the origin of the whole speech system results from architectural side effects 147

10 Constructing for Understanding 150.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [155]-161) and index.

ISBN:

019928914X

0199289158

OCLC:

65203001

Publisher Number:

9780199289141 (hbk.)

9780199289158 (pbk.)