Evolinguistics Symposium

Concepts and Categories
Date : Oct 29, 2019
Venue: KOMCEE West, B1, Lecture Hall, Komaba 1 Campus, The University of Tokyo
Program(Moderator: Harumi Kobyaashi)

13:30

Opening Remarks & Introduction (Koji Fujita)

13:50

Toshitaka Suzuki
Imagery in wild birds? Retrieval of visual information fromreferential alarm calls

14:30

Mutsumi Imai
Abductive inference in symbol grounding and system constructionin lexical acquisition

15:10 - 15:30
15:30

Coffee BreakW Tecumseh Fitch
Animal concepts, animal communication, and human cognition

16:20

Dedre Gentner
Metaphor, abstraction and language change

17:10

General Discussion (Kazuo Okanoya)

17:30

Closing Remarks & Reception

Organizers:
Harumi Kobayashi (Tokyo Denki University)
Kazuo Okanoya (University of Tokyo)
Koji Fujita (Kyoto University)
Supported by Evolinguistics, MEXTImagery in wild birds? Retrieval of visual information from referential alarm calls
Toshitaka Suzuki
The Hakubi Center for Advanced Research, Kyoto University
One of the core features of human speech is that words cause listeners to retrieve visual mental
images of target referents. However, although some animals produce specific vocalizations for specificobject categories, such as predators or food (i.e., functionally referential systems), whether these signals
evoke visual mental images in receivers is surprisingly unknown. In this talk, I review previous studies onfunctionally referential communication in nonhuman animals and introduce my recent study on vocal
communication in a wild bird, the Japanese tit (Parus minor). Japanese tits produce specific (i.e., functionallyreferential) alarm calls when and only when encountering a predatory snake. Field experiments reveal that
simply hearing these calls causes tits to become more visually perceptive to objects resembling snakes(moving sticks). However, tits do not respond to the same stick when hearing other call types or if thestick’s movement is dissimilar to that of a snake. These results indicate that before having detected a realsnake, tits retrieve its visual image from snake-specific alarm calls and uses this to search out snakes. This
new approach may help to reveal cognitive basis for referential communication, opening a new avenue forthe comparative studies on concepts and semantics in animals.

Abductive inference in symbol grounding and system construction in lexical acquisition
Mutsumi Imai
Keio University
Although Harnad (1990) raised the well-known “symbol-grounding problem” as the problem for AI
assuming symbolic systems, this problem may be seen as one faced by young children learning their firstlanguage, who have to learn thousands of words to build up their lexicon. I extend and reformulate theoriginal symbol grounding problem (Harnad, 1990) to address the problems children need to solve in theprocess of lexical acquisition, which include symbol emergence, embodiment, and construction of a systemof symbols. Here, the real problem for children is how to learn the meaning of a word without knowing
the semantic domain that the word belongs to, as well as without knowing the words surrounding thatword. In considering the reformulated version of the symbol grounding problem, I argue that one should
specify at least the following three problems in re-thinking “the symbol grounding problem”: (1) how
children make creative yet reasonably constrained abductive inferences about meanings of words, (2) how
they discover subsystems of language, and (3) what is the cognitive function that makes this possible.

Animal concepts, animal communication, and human cognition
W Tecumseh Fitch
University of Vienna
When some characteristic feature of human language is lacking in systems of animal communication(e.g. recursion or learning), that it represents a crucial gap in evolution, and evidence for an evolutionary
discontinuity. Here I argue that we should reverse this logic: because a defining feature of human language
is its ability to flexibly represent and recombine concepts, precursors for many important components oflanguage should be sought in animal cognition rather than animal communication. Animal communication
systems typically only permit expression of a small subset of the concepts that can be represented andmanipulated by that species, and this is a crucial fact in understanding our own cognition andcommunication.

Metaphor, abstraction and language change
Dedre Gentner
Northwestern University
Many of our abstract concepts have their origins in concrete domains. For example, sanctuary once
meant a house of worship, but now it can encompass any situation in which a person feels safe (e.g., ‘herwork is a sanctuary’). How do these abstract relational concepts come about—what are the processes
that lead to abstraction?
I will make the case for the Career of Metaphor theory, which states•

Metaphors and similes are typically understood via a process of structure-mapping from a baseconcept—which is often concrete and embodied—to a target concept.

•This process naturally leads to gradual abstraction over use, resulting in conventionalized
metaphoric meanings. Over time, these can come to serve as established concepts.

•Because the structure-mapping process favors relational mappings, these metaphoric concepts areoften relational abstractions.
This account suggests an intimate connection between metaphoric extension processes and theevolution of abstract concepts in language. Further, this account sheds light on the nature of relational
concepts and suggests a connection between relationality and abstractness.