Syntactic Structures and Code Parameters

Shu, Kevin; Marcolli, Matilde

doi:10.1007/s11786-017-0298-0

Cited by 9 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…If the distribution of the syntactic features across languages were the effect of an evolution of identically distributed independent random variables, one would expect to find the code points in the region of the space of code parameters populated by random codes in the Shannon random code ensembles, that is, in the region below the Gilbert-Varshamov curve. However, what one finds (see [44]) is the presence of many outliers that are not only above the Gilbert-Varshamov curve, but even above the symptotic bound and the Plotkin bound. This provides quantitative evidence for the fact that the evolutionary process that leads to the boundary distribution P of code parameters may differ significantly from the hypothesis of the phylogenetic model.…”

Section: Conditional Cases and Distance Estimatesmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…In [29] and [44], a quantitative test was devised, aimed at measuring how the distribution of syntactic parameters over a group of languages differs from the result of i.i.d. random variables.…”

Section: Conditional Cases and Distance Estimatesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Thus, the location of the point P on the variety contains information that is related to the spreading of syntactic features across the language family considered. This geometric way of thinking may be compared with the coding theory approach of [29], [44] to measuring the spread of syntactic features across a language family.…”

Section: Towards Larger Phylogenetic Trees: Graftingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…random variables evolving according to the same Markov model on a tree. Indeed, we know from various data analysis of the syntactic variables, including topological data analysis [39], [40], methods of coding theory [44], and recoverability in Kanerva networks [37], that the syntactic parameters are certainly not i.i.d. variables.…”

Section: Modifying the Setting To Account For Syntactic Relationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Phylogenetics of Indo-European Language Families via an Algebro-Geometric Analysis of Their Syntactic Structures

et al. 2021

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Using Phylogenetic Algebraic Geometry, we analyze computationally the phylogenetic tree of subfamilies of the Indo-European language family, using data of syntactic structures. The two main sources of syntactic data are the SSWL database and Longobardi's recent data of syntactic parameters. We compute phylogenetic invariants and estimates of the Euclidean distance functions for two sets of Germanic languages, a set of Romance languages, a set of Slavic languages and a set of early Indo-European languages, and we compare the results with what is known through historical linguistics.

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Section: Conditional Cases and Distance Estimatesmentioning

confidence: 95%

Section: Conditional Cases and Distance Estimatesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Towards Larger Phylogenetic Trees: Graftingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Modifying the Setting To Account For Syntactic Relationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Phylogenetics of Indo-European Language Families via an Algebro-Geometric Analysis of Their Syntactic Structures

et al. 2021

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“…When we look at the data points as syntactic features or syntactic parameters, with coordinates given by the values of the parameter over a given set of languages, we focus on the question of identifying relations between these syntactic variables. This is a main open question already investigated by other methods in [18], [31], [33], [38]. We analyze the clustering structure between syntactic parameters by analyzing the persistent connected components of the data at various scales and the resulting tree that follows the order in which the components merge as the scale parameter increases.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Topological Analysis of Syntactic Structures

2022

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We use the persistent homology method of topological data analysis and dimensional analysis techniques to study data of syntactic structures of world languages. We analyze relations between syntactic parameters in terms of dimensionality, of hierarchical clustering structures, and of non-trivial loops. We show there are relations that hold across language families and additional relations that are family-specific. We then analyze the trees describing the merging structure of persistent connected components for languages in different language families and we show that they partly correlate to historical phylogenetic trees but with significant differences. We also show the existence of interesting non-trivial persistent first homology groups in various language families. We give examples where explicit generators for the persistent first homology can be identified, some of which appear to correspond to homoplasy phenomena, while others may have an explanation in terms of historical linguistics, corresponding to known cases of syntactic borrowing across different language subfamilies.

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Syntactic Phylogenetic Trees

Shu

Aziz

Huynh

et al. 2018

Foundations of Mathematics and Physics One Century After Hilbert

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In light of recent controversies surrounding the use of computational methods for the reconstruction of phylogenetic trees of language families (especially the Indo-European family), a possible approach based on syntactic information, complementing other linguistic methods, appeared as a promising possibility, largely developed in recent years in Longobardi's Parametric Comparison Method. In this paper we identify several serious problems that arise in the use of syntactic data from the SSWL database for the purpose of computational phylogenetic reconstruction. We show that the most naive approach fails to produce reliable linguistic phylogenetic trees. We identify some of the sources of the observed problems and we discuss how they may be, at least partly, corrected by using additional information, such as prior subdivision into language families and subfamilies, and a better use of the information about ancient languages. We also describe how the use of phylogenetic algebraic geometry can help in estimating to what extent the probability distribution at the leaves of the phylogenetic tree obtained from the SSWL data can be considered reliable, by testing it on phylogenetic trees established by other forms of linguistic analysis. In simple examples, we find that, after restricting to smaller language subfamilies and considering only those SSWL parameters that are fully mapped for the whole subfamily, the SSWL data match extremely well reliable phylogenetic trees, according to the evaluation of phylogenetic invariants. This is a promising sign for the use of SSWL data for linguistic phylogenetics. We also argue how dependencies and nontrivial geometry/topology in the space of syntactic parameters would have to be taken into consideration in phylogenetic reconstructions based on syntactic data. A more detailed analysis of syntactic phylogenetic trees and their algebro-geometric invariants will appear elsewhere.

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Syntactic Structures and Code Parameters

Cited by 9 publications

References 23 publications

Phylogenetics of Indo-European Language Families via an Algebro-Geometric Analysis of Their Syntactic Structures

Phylogenetics of Indo-European Language Families via an Algebro-Geometric Analysis of Their Syntactic Structures

Topological Analysis of Syntactic Structures

Syntactic Phylogenetic Trees

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