Pater 2017: Generative linguistics and neural networks at 60: foundation, friction and fusion

Pater, Joe. 2017. Generative linguistics and neural networks at 60: foundation, friction and fusion. Manuscript, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

http://people.umass.edu/pater/pater-perceptrons-and-syntactic-structures-at-60.pdf

The first paper that cites a Phonolist posting? Thanks Ricardo and others I’ve talked to about this material…

Abstract. The birthdate of both generative linguistics and neural networks can be taken as 1957, the year of the publication of seminal work by both Noam Chomsky and Frank Rosenblatt. This paper traces the development of these two approaches to cognitive science, from their largely autonomous early development in their first thirty years, through their collision in the 1980s around the past tense debate (Rumelhart and McClelland 1986, Pinker and Prince 1988), and their integration in much subsequent work up to the present, 2017. Although these traditions are often presented as in opposition to one another, such a presentation assumes polar versions of each approach, and ignores the ever-growing body of results that have been achieved through integration.

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New paper: Generative linguistics and neural networks at 60