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Four ways from universal to particular: how Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters model is not selectionist

Four ways from universal to particular: how Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters model is not... Following the development of the selectionist theory of the immune system, there was an attempt to characterise many biological mechanisms as being ‘selectionist’ as juxtaposed with ‘instructionist’. However, this broad definition would group Darwinian evolution, the immune system, embryonic development, and Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters (P&P) language-acquisition mechanism together under the ‘selectionist’ umbrella, even though Chomsky’s mechanism and embryonic development are significantly different from the selectionist mechanisms of biological evolution and the immune system. Surprisingly, there is an abstract way using two dual mathematical logics to make the distinction between genuinely selectionist mechanisms and what are better called ‘generative’ or symmetry-breaking mechanisms. This distinction is outlined in this note. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Applied Non-Classical Logics Taylor & Francis

Four ways from universal to particular: how Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters model is not selectionist

Ellerman, David P.
Journal of Applied Non-Classical Logics , Volume 26 (3): 15 – Jul 2, 2016
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Four ways from universal to particular: how Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters model is not selectionist

Abstract

Following the development of the selectionist theory of the immune system, there was an attempt to characterise many biological mechanisms as being ‘selectionist’ as juxtaposed with ‘instructionist’. However, this broad definition would group Darwinian evolution, the immune system, embryonic development, and Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters (P&P) language-acquisition mechanism together under the ‘selectionist’ umbrella, even though...
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Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Copyright
© 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
ISSN
1958-5780
eISSN
1166-3081
DOI
10.1080/11663081.2016.1214803
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Following the development of the selectionist theory of the immune system, there was an attempt to characterise many biological mechanisms as being ‘selectionist’ as juxtaposed with ‘instructionist’. However, this broad definition would group Darwinian evolution, the immune system, embryonic development, and Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters (P&P) language-acquisition mechanism together under the ‘selectionist’ umbrella, even though Chomsky’s mechanism and embryonic development are significantly different from the selectionist mechanisms of biological evolution and the immune system. Surprisingly, there is an abstract way using two dual mathematical logics to make the distinction between genuinely selectionist mechanisms and what are better called ‘generative’ or symmetry-breaking mechanisms. This distinction is outlined in this note.

Journal

Journal of Applied Non-Classical Logics – Taylor & Francis

Published: Jul 2, 2016

Keywords: Selectionist; instructionist; generative mechanisms; Chomsky’s principles-and-parameters model; logic of partitions

References

  • Biochemistry and the sciences of recognition
  • General theory of natural equivalences
  • Counting distinctions: On the conceptual foundations of Shannon’s information theory
  • The logic of partitions: Introduction to the dual of the logic of subsets
  • An introduction to partition logic
  • Noam Chomsky’s linguistic theory
  • The natural selection theory of antibody formation
  • The generative grammar of the immune system
  • Towards an evolutionary theory of language
  • Evolution, selection and cognition: From ‘learning’ to parameter setting in biology and in the study of language