An anthropic principle in lieu of a "Universal Grammar".

Publikation: Beitrag in Buch/Bericht/Konferenzband/GesetzeskommentarKapitel in einem SammelbandForschungPeer-reviewed

Abstract

Among the many unanswered questions of grammar theory, the following figure prominently. First, what is it that enables children to successfully cope with the structural complexities of their mother tongue while professional grammarians tend to fail when modelling them? An innateness conjecture would beg the question. There is no compelling evidence for specific properties of linguistic expressions to be innate, that is, genetically coded somehow.

Second, what determines the narrow system corridor for human grammars? On the one hand, no two human languages share an identical rule system, but on the other hand, grammars demonstrably do not differ from each other "without limit and in unpredictable ways".

Third, are grammars of human languages offspring of a single proto-grammar instantiating a "Universal Grammar" (monogenetic) or are the shared traits of human grammars the result of convergent changes in the grammars of human languages of diverse ancestry (polygenetic)?

An analogue of the cosmological Anthropic Principle in combination with the Darwinian theory of evolution applied to self-replicating cognitive programmes helps clarifying these issues. There is no urge for assuming an innate "Universal Grammar". Languages will end up sharing fundamental grammatical properties as a result of the predictable convergent cognitive evolution of their grammars.
OriginalspracheDeutsch
TitelOf trees and birds.
Redakteure/-innenJessica Brown, Marta Wierzba , Andreas Schmidt
ErscheinungsortPotsdam
Herausgeber (Verlag)Universitätsverlag Potsdam
ISBN (Print)978-3-86956-457-9
DOIs
PublikationsstatusVeröffentlicht - 2019

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